500 words a day on whatever I want

How black was Ancient Egypt?

The simple answer, of course, is that no one in Ancient Egypt was black: “black” is an American social construct, something made up to make men into slaves, even those who are mostly European by blood.

The less-simple answer is to apply American ideas of race to ancient Egypt, something that people have been doing since the early 1800s.

Motives: Since American society is built on the idea that whites are naturally better than blacks, whites have reason to downplay the blackness of ancient Egypt while blacks have reason to play it up – because civilization in America goes all the way back to Egypt by way of the English, Romans and Greeks. If it turned out to be founded by black people, what would that say?

What they said in ancient times:

Herodotus said Egyptians had black skin and woolly hair, which is how he said the Ethiopians looked too.

Aristotle called both the Ethiopians and Egyptians black.

The Bible calls both the Ethiopians and Egyptians sons of Ham.

The Egyptians saw themselves as belonging to their own race, different from blacks to the south – but also different from all their other neighbours. On the other hand:

They called themselves kemet – “black”, though some say it just means they are from the land of black soil (the Nile).

They said they came from the land of Punt – a place they drew as having elephants and giraffes.

By the way, American slaveowners also saw blacks as the sons of Ham. That allowed them to use the Curse of Ham from the Bible to excuse their racism.

What the DNA says:

Present-day Egyptians are, by blood, about 60% Eurasian, like the Arabs who took over their country, and 40% black African. In the past they were, if anything, blacker because since the glory days of Ancient Egypt they have been taken over by the Persians, Greeks, Romans and Arabs. But even at 40% black they easily count as black according to America’s One Drop Rule, which sees even a drop of black African blood (in practice, about 10% or more) as enough to make you black.

What their language shows:

These days Egyptians speak Arabic, but in ancient times they spoke Egyptian, the stuff they wrote in hieroglyphics. That language came to Egypt from Ethiopia about 12,000 years ago. Of course, the language could have been brought to Egypt by some forgotten war, but it seems it came from settlers: one study shows the maternal blood line of Egyptians also goes back to Ethiopia.

Reconstructions:

Using high-powered computers, experts can now get a rough idea of how someone looked from their skull. They make a living at it by doing it for the police for murder cases. When the same thing is done to the skulls of King Tut and a mummy some believe is Queen Nefertiti, here is what you get (click on the pictures to find out more about them):

511 Responses

“Motives: Since American society is built on the idea that whites are naturally better than blacks…”

Your statement is so absurd it’s difficult to respond.

However, the best places to look for information about the building blocks of American society are probably in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence.

Those documents do a good job of expressing America’s ideals. In short, the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness.

You wrote:

“…whites have reason to downplay the blackness of ancient Egypt while blacks have reason to play it up – because civilization in America goes all the way back to Egypt by way of the English, Romans and Greeks.”

Yeah. According to you, whites base their self-worth on events and devleopments in the Nile region that occurred thousands of years ago. The fact that you believe this lunacy says a lot about your fears.

You wrote:

“If it turned out to be founded by black people, what would that say?”

Your scenario raises only one question. If blacks were the leaders of the world in those early days of cvilization, then what happened? What caused the great fall?

i personally believe that ancient Egyptians may have closely resembled Berbers of Northern and Western Africa. i’ve read somewhere (i don’t remember where exactly) that though ancient Egyptians were darker that ancient Romans/Arabs, they were not as dark as those in countries/kingdoms south of their border (Kushites/Sudanese). all in all, this was interesting.

well written, I know alot of egyptians and some of them I can actually see the black african in them. This one little boy looked exactly like my mixed cousin, he had pale skin and curly hair and hazel eyes and he was egyptian.

Here are some quotes form those who actually saw ‘live’ Egyptians of the time, and also some from De Volney, who is considered one of the originators of Egyptology as a discipline:

“It is in fact manifest that the Colchidians are Egyptian by race….several Egyptians told me that in their opinion the Colchidians were descended from soldiers of Sesostris. I had conjectured as much myself from two pointers, firstly becuase they have black skins and kinky hair (to tell the truth this proves nothing for other peoples have them too) and secondly and more reliably for the reason alone among mankind the Egyptians and the Ethiopians have practiced circumcision since time immemorial. Herodotus, Book II, 104

=================================== ‘Those who are too black are cowards, like for instance, the Egyptians and Ethiopians. But those who are excessively white are also cowards as we can see from the example of women, the complexion of courage is between the two.’ Aristotle, Physiognomy 6

. . the men of Egypt are mostly brown or black with a skinny and dessicated look”.
===================================
39-Ammianus Maarcellinus, Book XXII, para 16 (23).

“The Ethiopians,” says Lucian, page 985, “were the first who
invented the science of the stars, and gave names to the planets,
not at random and without meaning, but descriptive of the qualities
which they conceived them to possess; and it was from them that
this art passed, still in an imperfect state, to the Egyptians.”

There a people,
now forgotten, discovered, while others were yet barbarians, the
elements of the arts and sciences. A race of men now rejected from
society for their sable skin and frizzled hair, founded on the
study of the laws of nature, those civil and religious systems
which still govern the universe. Lower down, those dusky points
are the pyramids whose masses have astonished you.

@No_slappz….Empires rise and fall. That is the nature of history and politics. Their are many factors to the condition of some African countries. But colonialism, and so called “aid” are big factors.

“Your statement is so absurd it’s difficult to respond. However, the best places to look for information about the building blocks of American society are probably in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence. Those documents do a good job of expressing America’s ideals. In short, the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. “

No, This statement is absurd! When these documents were being written and made into law, America was wiping out the native population, engaging heavily in the transatlantic slave trade and becoming wealthy off of a free-labor based plantation economy. That is morally contradictory!!! Those documents were written at the time to only include ‘white’ men. They did not write these documents with the intent that it would ever (as far as they were concerned) include women or non-whites of any kind.

“Yeah. According to you, whites base their self-worth on events and devleopments in the Nile region that occurred thousands of years ago. The fact that you believe this lunacy says a lot about your fears.”

Yes, ‘whites’ do have a reason to claim Ancient Egypt was not originally ‘black’. Whites had to find a way to morally justify to the world and to themselves that ‘black’ people were inferior. Claiming that ‘black’ people never contributed anything to mankind was one of the them.
This topic is a big deal for whites cause Egyptian ideas gave birth to ancient Greece and then ancient Rome. If this is shown to be true it shows that centuries of racist perceptions to be unjustified.

I found it interesting how Europe’s greatest civilizations are very close to Africa. I don’t believe that is a coincidence.

no slappz makes me laugh he goes on about “if black people were so great what happend?” errr… slavery, colonialism things of that naturem hello

I think no slappz needs a slap lol

Anyways I predict this post uis going to get A LOT of comments. I have mentioned before that Black is a fairly new term and everyone in Africa didn’t go around as “Black” People identified as their ethnic group or “ethinic tribes”.

(I’ll use Nigeria as a example since I am Nigerian)
Even before Nigeria became known as Nigerian people were not saying “I am Nigerian” They were saying “I am Yoruba” or “I am Igbo” etc. That’s my take on it

“Even before Nigeria became known as Nigerian people were not saying “I am Nigerian” They were saying “I am Yoruba” or “I am Igbo” etc. That’s my take on it”

That is very true. I believe that African people should hold on to their ethnic affiliation because their diverse customs and religions deserve to be preserved. However, I think that Africans should also learn to view each other as Africans collectively and help each other out. The way I see it, Africa has such an abundance of resources that Africans shouldn’t have to go outside of their continent for ANYTHING! Africans could be able to trade just within Africa and be richer than any other continent in the world.

The ethnic wars are out of hand. If they want to move forward, they MUST come together. Europeans fought each other for centuries, but in the end they all recognize that together they are stronger then the are individually. I think that because of how modern day global economics and politics are structured African people don’t have a choice but to see themselves as a collective ( by that I mean politically and economically, not culturally).

I believe the Egyptians were a mixed race people with genetic influence from black Africa, Semitic people from the middle east as well as whiter people from the near east and Mediterranean. When you look at their paintings, you will see a pretty wide variety of skin shades from African black to European white, though most of then portray an olive complexion. I also think that as you went further south, the blacker they became, and the further north, the whiter they became. Egypt was under black Nubian rule during the 25th dynasty. So black genes were definitely in the mix there amongst others.

“tulio
I believe the Egyptians were a mixed race people with genetic influence from black Africa, Semitic people from the middle east as well as whiter people from the near east and Mediterranean. When you look at their paintings, you will see a pretty wide variety of skin shades from African black to European white, though most of then portray an olive complexion. I also think that as you went further south, the blacker they became, and the further north, the whiter they became. Egypt was under black Nubian rule during the 25th dynasty. So black genes were definitely in the mix there amongst others.”

Yeah you’ll believe that because whites don’t think anything great can come from someone that is just plain black, unless they are mixed.

The egyptians were black people, deal with it.

Wouldn’t surprise me one bit if a white scholar went into all the tombs they could and painted over the egyptian figures with peach flesh tone to make them look white.

I don’t focus much on civilization, it’s culture. We denigrate our ancestors when we try to claim ancestors not our own. Some of us may have ancestors of the Benin civilization, but many of our ancestors still had stone technology. Civilization, technically that means the people have stopped migrating and live in cities. Small villages can be stable economic environments that are sustained by agriculture and tool making. What makes a viable society is our social structure; our family relationships, how we value children, treat our elders. deal with justice and how the society creates a sense of place. As black people these are the things we should value, we shouldn’t define ourselves by how well we compare to white people.

The idea of racial purity is a non-starter anyway. People have been moving around and intermarrying since time-immemorial.

Americans used to deny that the Queen of Sheba was black, even though she came from Ethiopia. They thought she looked like this. Notice how her servants are black but she’s depicted as a white woman. That was the general depiction.

Great post Aba:) I agree, this country owes a lot to the fact that whites at the time thought they were superior to everyone else. How else would they justify taking over land already inhabited and kidnapping people across the ocean to work as slaves?? I found out a long time ago that if I wanted to learn the truth about my heritage before slavery, I had to teach it to myself. Is it me, or does Tut look a bit like Columbus Short??

Americans used to deny that the Queen of Sheba was black, even though she came from Ethiopia. They thought she looked like this. Notice how her servants are black but she’s depicted as a white woman. That was the general depiction.

Yeah. It was the same thing when Elizabeth Taylor portrayed Cleopatra.

Race Race isn’t a biological category, it’s cultural. There’s nothing- nothing!- in the Egyptian sources that mentions “race”. Egyptians did not have “race” as a category. They did not think of themselves as members of a particular race, nor did they think of other people as such. Of course, they did think of themselves as different than the other peoples. This image shows foreigners (as portrayed in Ramses III temple in Medinet Habu). Yes, they did notice difference ins kin tones or hair, but those were equal so to speak, to other differences, such as clothes.

None of these people are portrayed as Egyptians. I don’t have an image of an Egyptian, but their skin tone (for males) was darker than “Asians” (that lived in Syria and Palestine) but lighter than Nubians.

So what? So nothing. Egyptians did not recognize “race” as a special category. So, why do we discuss race of Ancient Egyptians? Because it matters to us.

Afrocentrism vs Eurocentrism We all see the problem. Some people (usually white, I guess) claim that the white culture was superior, because it gave all those technologies, cultures, great empires and civilizations. Ok, their first mistake is to forget about Ancient China or Azctecs. So they say- in any case, there was never a great Africancivilization. Ancient Egypt? They were white!

Afrocentrism goes in the opposite (but not quite THE opposite) direction and says: there was a great African civilization- Ancient Egypt! That was a black civilization. And that’s not all! Ancient Egypt influenced (some people even claim- colonized) early Greece, so all the Greek knowledge actually came from Egypt, from Africa. And since is believed that western civilization started with Ancient Greece, we can see the point: the western civilization, in fact, started in Ancient Egypt. It is African, it is black, and it was later (during the imperialism) stolen and fabricated by white people, who could not stand the fact modern western civilization is, in fact, black.

The problem is: Why Egypt? This story make sense… But why Egypt? Why do Afrocentrics claim Egypt was great ancient civilization? Why Egypt, when there are other civilizations that are without any doubt black in any and every sense of the word (even in those aspect that Egypt, perhaps, wasn’t)? Why Egypt, if there’s Nubia, if there’s Great Zimbabwe?

The answer is simple. They don’t have pyramids, and all the wonders of Ancient Egypt that are so important for the history.

Really? Says who?

<em?Says white, European civilization!

See, the problem with this aspect of Afrocentric beliefs is that it’s, in fact, way to much Eurocentric. White western culture says Egypt is more important than Nubia or Zimbabwe. White western culture is dominant in today’s world, so many of our beliefs are shaped the way white western culture dictates.

There’s no reason for Egypt to be more important than any other culture or civilization. So, rather than questioning race of Ancient Egyptians, maybe we should question why we find this culture more interesting than some others.

My personal opinion I must admit I don’t know much about race, and I don’t know what is considered “black”. But if I have to state my opinion, I’d say Ancient Egyptians weren’t black as people from West Africa, but they were not Caucasian either. But, like I said, that’s not the main point here. What is main point here is- why is that important today?

Herodotus: As wonderful as his books are, they are not the most accurate historical source. Many of his claims can not be proved. In fact, they’re often contradicted by other sources (archaeological, Egyptian texts, etc). Herodotus IS a valuable source, but for some other things. I know this post isn’t about him, I just had to add this. I love his work but that’s another matter.

About Cleopatra: She was the last Egyptian queen, but she was, in fact, Macedonian. True, some of her ancestors are unknown (there’s a possibility that one of her grandmothers was African), but in any case, Cleopatra isn’t the best example here because she was mostly European and therefore do not represent an “average” Egyptian (if there’s such a thing).

Given that Cleopatra came from Macedonia, the likelihood of her being black in the sense we understand the word today(sub-saharan black/negroid), is extremely unlikely. For some reason this issue of Cleopatra’s race seems to be highly controversial in the black community.

tulio: Like I said, there is a possibility one of her grandmothers was African (black). I won’t go into the debate whether that makes Cleopatra black or not.

But the problem is: why Cleopatra? Even with a black grandmother, she was still Macedonian, and doesn’t represent an average Ancient Egyptian. Why is Cleopatra so important, when there are so many others. There’s whole Egyptian dynasty ruled by Nubians (who were black).

Once again, because Cleopatra is more famous. Why? Because Romans made her famous. Romans = White western civilization (at least in this case).

@ Mira…“My personal opinionI must admit I don’t know much about race, and I don’t know what is considered “black”. But if I have to state my opinion, I’d say Ancient Egyptians weren’t black as people from West Africa, but they were not Caucasian either. But, like I said, that’s not the main point here. What is main point here is- why is that important today?”

I think that Egypt in its later dynasties was more mixed because of trade with Greece. But the very beginnings were African. However, what exactly do you mean by “as black”? African people come in various shades naturally. Not all pure blood Africans are of a deep dark brown complexion. West Africa is not the only part of Africa with very dark complexioned people. Many eastern Africans (i.e. Ethiopians, Sudanese, Kenyans) and southern Africans are also of varying shades of brown.

I love how when it comes to comes to Egypt, historians assume that just because they weren’t of the deepest shade of brown that they must be mixed with white blood and therefore not black African. Its like the one-drop rule in reverse lol! Obviously if they are tan-to-white complexioned then yes they were more than likely Greek/Macedonian or some mixture thereof. But, all those people in the Egyptian paintings of varying brown complexions doesn’t necessarily mean their mixed with anything.

P.S. yes Africa had many other wonderful civilizations. However either alot of misconceptions have been told about African civilizations or they completely ignore west African and south African civilizations. Many historians don’t won’t to admit that the beginnings of Egypt were black; when much evidence points to it.

@ Mira:
I agree with your point that letting Eurocentric standards and values serve as the measuring tool is problematic in itself (I hope I’m accurately interpreting what you said). It makes me think of alleged IQ tests. I say alleged because to me, it’s obvious that these tests DON’T measure IQ. Given the many ways that intelligence is applied in different situations, it’s ridiculous to think that 1 test, developed from 1 perspective, can measure intelligence in it’s entirety for every person. No one test can even begin to capture all the different aspects of someone’s intelligence. But look at what happens: 1. create the test, 2. claim (falsely) that it measures intelligence, 3. use the test to label and define people. The validity of the test itself is never questioned, when it should be. Instead, I’m left to question myself if I score poorly on it, regardless of what else might be apparent in myself and my life.

I don’t mean to go off from the main topic of the post, but I think the point is worth highlighting. Many ways of looking at the world, making assessments, and measuring, are ethnocentric and fundamentally flawed. So using these approaches and measurements leads to conclusions that are also fundamentally flawed and/or conclusions that will typically be favorouably biased towards the ones who developed those approaches and measurements in the first place.

I don’t know. I don’t know what it really means to be black (when it comes to identity). When it comes to biology, there’s no such thing as “black”. Yes, there are various skin shades in Africa, and I am aware of that; but that is not my point. Skin tone doesn’t make a race.

Ancient Egyptians didn’t have category of “race”, it simply didn’t exist in their world. To apply such a category as race to those people is anachronistic. That is the main problem with the debate. It doesn’t matter at all how they looked (the shade of their skin, the colour of their eyes, their hair, etc) because race isn’t biological, it’s cultural thing.

In other words, to question “race” of Ancient Egyptians matter (and makes sense) only to us.

And yes, I know Ancient Egypt is an African civilization, there’s no doubt about that. But then again, I hope we agree it’s not the point here. But then again, Ancient Egyptians would disagree about this as well, since “Africa” didn’t mean anything to them (they didn’t see themselves as Africans).

It’s not just Egypt. Take Ancient Greece for example. It’s believed to be THE beginning of European (western). civilization. Still, Greeks didn’t: a) consider themselves European (if nothing else, they – like more or less any other culture- consider themselves center of the world, and had many contacts not with barbaric Europe but with (still barbaric) but more advanced civilizations of the south and east, Egypt and Middle East). And b) If we’re talking about geography, Greece isn’t “western” western- it’s located on the Balkans. Of course Balkan peninsula is in Europe, but is usually not considered “western”, and this story has its own “ups and downs” when it comes to identity, imperialism, stealing someone’s culture, etc.

1. Well, it’s about the image average person has about a particular culture. Average person’s image of Egypt isn’t realistic, but it doesn’t matter- average person see Egypt as something great and important, and Nubia for example, as something “not so important” (key word here is, I think, “important”, not “great”).

(off topic) The sad thing is that we don’t really know that much about Ancient Egypt. We know a lot about life of their upper class and their monuments. But we don’t know much about lives of average people.

2. That is horrible, but that’s American problem, it has nothing to do with Ancient Egypt.

Herodotus may have been inaccurate about certain cultural and, or, religious facts about Ancient Egypt. However, as to describing the people, he saw them in person. In many instances, in his writings, he prefaces what he writes with disclaimers as to the validity of his sources. In describing the inhabitants, he describes what he saw. There are other ancient writers who describe the Egyptians as black even after repeated invasions by Persians, Greeks and Romans.

I have a friend who recently went to Egypt. I asked her what the people looked like. For the most part, they looked black in the North American definition of such. In fact she was greeted with “welcome home sister” by some of the natives. If she was to write of her experiences in Egypt, and the writing was found a few thousand years hence, people would question the validity of her accounts when it came to describing customs perhaps, but eyewitness accounts as to how the populace looked? I don’t think so.

Someone said that the earlier dynasties were black with little to no admixture. I believe this to be so. After the invasion of the Hyksos, who were driven out by the founders of the 18th dynasty, some admixture may have began to take place. Despite the mass invasion of others and with it admixture presumably, the Egyptians still managed to maintain strong black physical characteristics as evinced by De Volney’s writings of the late 1700, early 1800s. Bottom line, if you were to transplant an Ancient Egyptian to the American South during slavery or Jim Crow, they would have been seen and treated as black. They would today be treated with the ‘colour blind’ philosophy prevalent in society. I doubt King Tut would have been served a cup of coffee at the local segregated diner unless he sat in the ‘coloured section’. What I would like to know is why people try to explain away what eyewitnesses a few thousand years ago. Look at the names of these writers, they weren’t lightweights. Why would they lie? They were not writing from any racialized vantage point as today. Their descriptions were that, descriptions

I mentioned Herodotus because I had to (archaeology of Greece is my major, so whenever I talk about a subject like this one, I mention him). It wasn’t in reply to you and I didn’t do it to disagree with you.

I don’t know if your friend is black or white, but my (white) friend has a bit different experience (which doesn’t mean anything, really). My friend looks Middle Eastern (at least that’s what people say) and natives thought she was one of them. So maybe that’s the way they greet tourists?

In any case, this is important:

if you were to transplant an Ancient Egyptian to the American South during slavery or Jim Crow, they would have been seen and treated as black. They would today be treated with the ‘colour blind’ philosophy prevalent in society. I doubt King Tut would have been served a cup of coffee at the local segregated diner unless he sat in the ‘coloured section’.

And that’s exactly what I’m talking about. I don’t know much about Jim Crow and segregation rules, but Ancient Egyptians didn’t look like an average Caucasian, that’s for sure. Tutankhamun was an African man. He might not be an important ruler in Egyptian history, but he is the most famous.

And back to Herodotus. I will check my translation of the second book to see how Colchidians are described. The problem with the passage you mentioned isn’t description of people and their appearance, it’s Sesostris and his alleged colonization. If that is true, then why Egyptian sources don’t talk about it?

Absolutely brilliant post. I’m lovin’ the comments by Mira,Herneith and Susan. Keep em comin. I’m learnin a lot about history! If I had more time on my hands I’d formally study it! Its beautifully fascinating!

Speaking of getting served a cup of coffee. You have to remember that the south’s whites were Scot Irish, Irish and English, so any hint of yellow in your skin and you could be questioned. Ever wonder why outside of Louisiana, there were no Mediterranean immigrants.

Modern Egyptians were suspect when I went to college in the early sixties. The heavy Arabic accent only allowed them to be served out side of the campus area.Some time it was really tough for white folk trying to decide what the foreign students were, because the university would come down on the establishments if they discriminated against them. Now this did not cover the dark skinned African.

This is how the Egyptians viewed race and the way they portrayed the various races in that part of the world. The Nubians were shown as black Africans and the Egyptians shown as brownish skinned. It shows “Asiatics” as much lighter then themselves, yet not as dark as blacks. The Egyptians seemed to be sort of an in between race.

This is how the Egyptians viewed race and the way they portrayed the various races in that part of the world. The Nubians were shown as black Africans and the Egyptians shown as brownish skinned. It shows “Asiatics” as much lighter then themselves, yet not as dark as blacks. The Egyptians seemed to be sort of an in between race.

I just think ancient Egyptians resemble people from the Horn of Africa (Ethiopia, Somalia) as well as Southern Sudanese Bantu phenotypes. I think there was just an overlap of various features with obvious what we call “black” admixture today.

Someone mentioned that Eygptians saw themselves as different from other “races”. Of course, they would see themselves as different. It’s the culture.

Back then, Culture ALWAYS took precedence over phenotypes.

Eygptian is a culture, Nubian is a culture- It’s always possible for two groups to share similar phenotypical features and yet, see themselves as different and unique from the other.

I’m pretty sure before western colonization, the Igbo and Yoruba tribe of Nigeria saw themselves as “different” and yet they are now classified as black African.

Greeks and Romans also saw themselves as “different” from the Germanic tribes and the Gauls even though they share similar skin tones. But people today agree that Greeks, Romans, Germanics, and Celts are now classified as white.

Yet, if folks apply this same concept to ancient Egyptians, suddenly there is backtracking to anything BUT black even though the earliest account of what ancient Eygptians look like is similar to Iman Bowie-type who is “black”

Kat, since none of us were around back then, the only think we can rely on to indicate the skin color of the Egyptians were the paintings they made of themselves. They clearly portrayed themselves as a copper-skinned people. They were not white. And did not portray themselves as white. They did paint other races to the north as white, but not themselves. They also did not paint themselves as black either, even though that color was available to them. They painted ancient Nubians as black but not themselves.

Now I don’t know why people get so upset when you imply that ancient Egypt wasn’t black in the sense that the rest of Africa is. The Nubians certainly were black as the Egyptians themselves even said. If this is all about taking pride in black civilization, why not take pride in the Nubians rather than the Egyptians? The Nubians had more pyramids than Egypt. They had an alphabet. They had armies and trade. They had an advanced ancient civilization. Why do so many black people prefer claiming Egypt over Nubia when Nubia is clearly the blacker of these two neighboring ancient civilizations? Plus much of Egypt’s culture came from Nubia.

tulio
Kat, since none of us were around back then, the only think we can rely on to indicate the skin color of the Egyptians were the paintings they made of themselves. They clearly portrayed themselves as a copper-skinned people. They were not white. And did not portray themselves as white. They did paint other races to the north as white, but not themselves. They also did not paint themselves as black either, even though that color was available to them. They painted ancient Nubians as black but not themselves.

Now I don’t know why people get so upset when you imply that ancient Egypt wasn’t black in the sense that the rest of Africa is. The Nubians certainly were black as the Egyptians themselves even said. If this is all about taking pride in black civilization, why not take pride in the Nubians rather than the Egyptians? The Nubians had more pyramids than Egypt. They had an alphabet. They had armies and trade. They had an advanced ancient civilization. Why do so many black people prefer claiming Egypt over Nubia when Nubia is clearly the blacker of these two neighboring ancient civilizations? Plus much of Egypt’s culture came from Nubia.”

LOL “Copper-skinned”
the acceptable color that whites will condone when they don’t want to say the color black.

Did you pick that up at walmart in a can?
White people are always spraying themselves orange thinking they look “golden and glowing.” LOL

Whenever white people don’t want to say black they will say mixed or tanned. LOL

The Egyptians were black people and white people just want to take credit for Ancient Egyptian achievements by re-writing history to suit their superiority complex.

National geographic had a recent article entitled THE BLACK PHAROAHS. as well as documenting the racist attitudes of the archeologists (by smashing off the African features of the statues) and covering/minimizing any evidence of positive African presence

Dr. Cheik Anta Diop postulates the Yourba of today are quite possibly the Yourpa of Ancient Egypt spoken of by the Ancient Greeks.

The Dogon of Mali are known to be physically related to the Ancient Egyptians.

As stated in this post the Ancient Egyptians referred to themselves as Khemetans (Blacks). I have once read that “others” call Khemet the land of black soil. I’ve come to understand Khemet to mean the “Land of the Black’s”. If it were black soil alone why would they refer to themselves as Khemetans?

As for the “Khemet land of the blacks” matter, remember that the word “black” is sociological concept that doesn’t mean the same thing across various cultures and times. In Russia, they refer to people from central Asia(all those “-istan” countries) as “blacks”. People from Ireland with dark hair and eyes refer to themselves as “Black Irish”. In both cases we’re talking about Caucasian people being referred to as blacks. In the U.S., we have a definition of black that means anybody with any degree of recognizable sub-saharan African ancestry.

So do we know what concept that ancient Egyptians used the world black?

About Khemet. Khemet was the name of their land (country), that’s how they called Egypt. “Khemet”, strictly speaking, means “black land”. Black (fertile) as the opposite of red (infertile) land. It has nothing to do with skin colour.

There isn’t anything in the Egyptian sources that indicates that “black” in their land name means “black people” in today’s (racial) meaning of the word.

This doesn’t mean Egyptians weren’t black. It means they didn’t have “race” as a cultural category.

Race isn’t biological, it’s cultural category. It’s not “natural” to think about race, it’s cultural. Many cultures, especially the Ancient ones (Egyptians, Greeks) didn’t have “race” as a category. So why would they name themselves “black” if that didn’t mean anything to them?

Some people love to claim Egypt was black with no evidence to back it up.Ordinarily, if someone has a theory which involves a radical departure from what the experts have professed, he is expected to defend his position by providing evidence in its support. But no one seemed to think it was appropriate to ask for evidence from the instructors who claimed that the Greeks stole their philosophy from Egypt.

For example, until recently, no one ever asked whether Cleopatra might have had an African ancestor, because our surviving ancient sources identify her as a Macedonian Greek. Her ancestors, the Ptolemies, were descended from one of Alexander’s generals. After Alexander’s death in 323 B. C., these generals divided up among themselves the territory in the Mediterranean that Alexander had conquered. The name Cleopatra was one of the names traditionally given to women in the royal family; officially our Cleopatra (69-30 BC) was Cleopatra VII, the daughter of Ptolemy XII and his sister. Cleopatra VII herself followed the family practice of marrying within the family. She married her two brothers (Ptolemy XIII and XIV) in succession (after the first died in suspicious circumstances, she had the second murdered). Her first language was Greek; but she was also the first member of the Ptolemaic line who was able to speak Egyptian. She also wore Egyptian dress, and was shown in art in the dress of the goddess Isis. She chose to portray herself as an Egyptian not because she was Egyptian, but because she was ambitious to stay in power. In her surviving portraits on coins and in sculpture she appears to be impressive rather than beautiful, Mediterranean in appearance, with straight hair and a hooked nose. Of course these portraits on metal and stone give no indication of the color of her skin.
The only possibility that she might not have been a full-blooded Macedonian Greek arises from the fact that we do not know the precise identity of one member of her family tree. We do not know who her grandmother was on her father’s side. Her grandmother was the mistress (not the wife) of her grandfather, Ptolemy IX. Because nothing is known about this person, the assumption has always been that she was a Macedonian Greek, like the other members of Ptolemy’s court. Like other Greeks, the Ptolemies were wary of foreigners. They kept themselves apart from the native population, with brothers usually marrying sisters, or uncles marrying nieces, or in one case a father marrying his daughter (Ptolemy IX and Cleopatra Berenice III). Because the Ptolemies seemed to prefer to marry among themselves, even incestuously, it has always been assumed that Cleopatra’s grandmother was closely connected with the family. If she had been a foreigner, one of the Roman writers of the time would have mentioned it in their invectives against Cleopatra as an enemy of the Roman state. These writers were supporters of Octavian (later known as Augustus) who defeated Cleopatra’s forces in the battle of Actium in 31 B.C.

The question of race matters only insofar as it is necessary to show that no classicists or ancient historians have tried to conceal the truth about the origins of the Greek people or the ancestry of certain famous ancient figures. It has been suggested that classicists have been reluctant to ask questions about Greek origins, and that we have been so “imbued with conventional preconceptions and patterns of thought” that we are unlikely to question the basic premises of our discipline. But even though we may be more reluctant to speculate about our own field than those outside it might be, none of us has any cultural “territory” in the ancient world that we are trying to insulate from other ancient cultures.

@pedlyde…Cleopatra was only part black. Probably 20%-50%. In other words she was more than likely bi-racial. We aren’t discussing Cleopatra, but the origins of Egypt. Egypt was around for much, much longer than the reign of Cleopatra. The later quarter of Egypt was ruled by Greeks/Macedonians. We aren’t arguing that point.

You said it yourself..she tried to appear Egyptian to stay in power. The fact that she wore braided wigs and dark makeup is a clue, albeit a small one, to know who she was was trying to emulate. If none of us have any cultural “territory” in the ancient world why did whites find it necessary to claim they were white from the start instead of stating that they weren’t sure.

@Mira…I agree race is a fairly new concept. Of course, Ancient Egyptians wouldn’t consider themselves black; they didn’t call they land they lived on Africa either. As aforementioned above, it wasn’t ‘black’ people as their known today that depicted Ancient Egyptians as blue-eyed ‘white’ people. Once ‘white’ dominated Hollywood decided to portray them that way these debates started. The bottom line is that Hollywood and Historians had no business creating these inaccurate images and perceptions in the first place.

They kept themselves apart from the native population, with brothers usually marrying sisters, or uncles marrying nieces, or in one case a father marrying his daughter (Ptolemy IX and Cleopatra Berenice III).

No, this was a tradition going back thousands of years in ancient Egypt among the royal families. Perhaps they were following these traditions. If they wished to keep themselves apart from the native populace, they would have married other Macedonians or Greeks, not incestuously. The pharaoh had to marry a daughter or female of the direct line of the previous pharaoh in order to legitimize his claim. He didn’t necessarily have to be ‘royal’ to do this. There are many such examples through Egyptian history. Towards the end of the 18th dynasty for example, Horemhab became pharaoh, and he had previously been a general with no discernible blood relation to the royal family.

The question of race matters only insofar as it is necessary to show that no classicists or ancient historians have tried to conceal the truth about the origins of the Greek people or the ancestry of certain famous ancient figures.

This post isn’t about the origins of ancient Greeks. It’s about Ancient Egyptians. Nobody questions the origins of the Greeks(funny that), however they go into high dudgeon when questioning the race of Ancient Egyptians. Why is this? Then you get the ones who say there was no notion of race as there is today. This is true to a certain extent, however they did have a notions of race but this was for descriptive reasons. If you read some of the ancient authors, they do ascribe certain characteristics to groups in particular, fellow European ones. The Egyptians while seeing themselves as a distinct group, would be the equivalent of Europeans seeing themselves as French, Germans, Swedes etc. They are all ‘white’ however. The ancient Greeks referred to Africa as ‘Ethiopia’ which encompassed Nubia, Meroe, Cush, Aksum etc. The author of this post is states clearly:The less-simple answer is to apply American ideas of race to ancient Egypt, something that people have been doing since the early 1800s.The simple answer, of course, is that no one in Ancient Egypt was black: “black” is an American social construct, something made up to make men into slaves, even those who are mostly European by blood.
He goes on to state:The less-simple answer is to apply American ideas of race to ancient Egypt, something that people have been doing since the early 1800s.The less-simple answer is to apply American ideas of race to ancient Egypt, something that people have been doing since the early 1800s.

This is what is being discussed. The question of the Ancient Egyptian’s appearance has been racialized and politicized. For some reason, it was, is hard for many people to accept this. Africans come in many shades and don’t conform to one particular phenotype. It is therefore not inconceivable that the Ancient Egyptians were black, especially if you apply today’s litmus test(North American) to what constitutes ‘black’. What I find disconcerting are those who feel a need to explain this away using either a colour blind ‘mixed’ explanation or something else. Funny how they don’t do this for Greeks, as it is presumed that they were mostly ‘white’. Yet they go all ape feces when something to the contrary is posited. They demand ‘proof’. Well proof is subjective within this discipline, and no, I am not claiming they are black. I find it amusing when they start carrying on as if they have been personally insulted. It can’t be put down to solely proof etc. If that were it, then they would just ignore it as most people will believe what they want, they wouldn’t really care. They would carry on with their proofs and scholarship.

They (we) do, actually. Like with any other culture, we aren’t quite certain about their origins. We know a lot, but not enough.

Then you get the ones who say there was no notion of race as there is today. This is true to a certain extent, however they did have a notions of race but this was for descriptive reasons.

True. Ancient people weren’t blind or colourblind. They could see someone’s skin tone, hair or eyes. However, those were treated as mere physical facts. If there was something “unusual” about a foreign person, Ancient writers noted, but that was usually something about clothes, language and customs.

To some cultures, language was the most important factor that divided the world into “us” and “them”. “We” speak Greek. “They” (barbarians) do not. Physical differences, such as skin tone was noted, but usually treated as no more important than today’s notion of hair colour among white people (ok, this one has light brown hair, and that one red; no big deal).

What some of you forget, is that color is also an adaptation, not necessarily from any mixture. Lets say that in different regions of Africa, perhaps 20,000 year ago, color separated along the latitude with reference to the equator. It didn’t mean that the features were any different, over time the features changed from the predominance of certain families, which gave somewhat slight differences in appearances, but not necessarily color. It is highly doubtful the early man was as dark as some would think, because his environment was in a temperate zone. As man migrated and without the benefits of some technologies to protect his skin, melanin helped protect him from the environment. Otherwise why would some Indians and indigenous Australians be very dark. Later on color became less important in mans survival and there was less selection for color as man migrated.

The Egyptians, 10000 years ago could have very well have been the same people as the Nubians.

@Mira….It’s true that we don’t know everything about Ancient Greece, but very, very rarely does anyone question what race they were. They may question their customs, religions, mathematics, etc., but never their race. You never hear black people claiming Greece or Rome, but many euro-centric scholars feel they can white-wash Egypt.

I never hear the Greeks being questioned, the Greeks are considered default white by white people.

Yes, they are questioned. I don’t know why you never hear about it; perhaps Egypt is more interesting to general public. Read Black Athena if you’re interested in this problem.

However, with Greeks, we have the same problem as with Egyptians. Race didn’t mean anything in their world. They separated world into “us” and “them” based on language. If you weren’t speaking Greek, you were a barbarian. However, there were barbarians and barbarians. Some of them were treated as really inferior and barely human. Others, such as Egyptians and Romans, while still barbarians, were seen in more positive light.

And the great Greek debate actually already hapened. Remember, not all white people are the same. Some of them believe to be superior to the others. During the 18th and 19th century, people of western Europe learned Ancient Greece was cradle of European civilizations. So they went to Greece (who was under Otomans at the time), and they were disgusted. Instead of noble, white, wise men they saw the ugly Greek peasants. Those “ugly” Greek peasants were still white, but they were darker (darker skin and hair), of poor inferior culture. British people (and people of western Europe) could not believe these pathetic beingh were the descendants (is that the right word?) of those noble Ancient philosophers and scientists! So they said- these peasants are not true Europeans, we are! Ancient Greece wasn’t cradle of their civilization, it’s ours. So they stole (more or less) the heritage, and sometimes I think literally, they stole monuments and moved them to western Europe, because, you know, modern Greeks are unworhty the great Ancient Greek culture. They are not truly Europeans.

So the point is, whether Ancient Greeks were black as people of Western Africa or simply darker whites like todays Greeks, isn’t really important. The decision was already made- Ancient Greeks were like western Europeans.

The second century AD Roman writer Arrian compared Indians, Ethiopians and Egyptians in his “Anabasis Alexandri”:

“The appearance of the inhabitants, too, is not so far different in India and Ethiopia; the southern Indians resemble the Ethiopians a good deal, and are black of countenance, and their hair black also, only they are not as snub-nosed or so woolly-haired as the Ethiopians; but the northern Indians are most like the Egyptians in appearance.”

,When I think of the Ancient Egyptians I think that they were probrably an unmixed black civilization in the beginning. Then, as time progressed, they became more mixed but you would still consider them black just a little lighter. I mean most African-Americans are mostly black with a small amount of white european ancestry. African Americans come in all shades but they are still black. The picture that Tulio provided where it showed the Libyans, Nubians, and then Ancient Egyptians proved to me what I believed all along. The Egyptian man still looks black just slightly lighter than the Nubian. He does not look white and he doesn’t look half white but he looks like a black man who might be slightly mixed like the typical African American. I think the only reason why you see so many lightskinned Egytians today is because of the huge amount of Arabs who left the middle east shortly after so many Middle Easterners were converted to Islam. They traveled all over the world and took over many different nations such as those in North Africa. The people that lived in South America 500 years were the red men. But they were conquered by the Spanish and now many of the people are mestizos, some are pure indian, and some are mostly Spanish. That does not mean that the Ancient Mayans, Incas, and Actzecs weren’t red. It just means they were eventually conquered and now the appearance of South America has changed somewhat. That is what could have happened to Ancient Egypt. The people could have resembled African Americans and, after being conquered by the Arabs, their appearance has now changed. And it sounds to me that the dna test have proven it. The modern egyptian is a mixture of Arabic and African. I don’t know. That is just my theory.

Also, I want to make a comment to the man who said something about how is it possible for the Ancient Egyptians to be black yet blacks lagg behind so badly today. There are many nations that were once great but because hostile forces took over and robbed that nation of its resources, they are now in poverty. For the past 500 years Africa has been robbed of its resources. And one of its greatest resouces was the people themselves. Slavery robbed Africa of millions of its people. Also, slavery caused Africans to fight other Africans. A house divided against itself cannot stand. Africa is still suffering because of slavery and colonization by Europeans. The same thing happened to the Native Americans. So its very possible.

Thank you J for posting the manuampim website. This site show the fakeness and malnipulation by whites & Arabs. How they falsified the tombs and everything so they can try to EARASE the black faces of the ORIGINAL Egyptian. Egyptian came from the south. Which means they came from SUDAN & ETHIOPIA. Not GREECE. They are the ones who brought so much creativity, education, writing, art, math, and so much more to Egypt. As a matter of fact, Greece/Rome got its civilization from Egypt. The Greeks and Romans came to Egypt as students. Then, turned on the Egyptian and used ALL of what they learned FROM the Egyptian against them. This is ( I believe) how Rome left their mark on Egypt.

The reason why black people lagg behind so bad today is because most of it has alot to do with how whites kept blacks back for so long. And it starts with slavery. The master mind of malnipulation and whitewashing black folks mind starts with how the white man did his damage to the black race. The other part is blamed on black people themselves for continuing to hold on to what the white man taught blacks for sooooo long. So everytime I hear how some white person say something like why blacks lagg this or lagg that, I say its because of racism. Whites know more about our people then we know about oursevles and that is why (for the most part) black people lagg so much. Cause YT haled/hold us back and so do our own.

Black people can do anything and everything they want as long as they put their minds to it without the ignorance of racist cowards who discrminate against blacks.

I am familiar with his work. I just wanted to read more about those “Table of nations” interpretations. Still doesn’t make sense to me, since it contradicts with everything we know about Ancient Egypt and all the other sources.

The Egyptian Race According to the Classical Authors of Antiquity – ie those who saw them in the flesh, and wrote the following

1. Heredotus -480 (?) to -425 BCE

‘It is in fact manifest that the Colchidians (ie around Armenia, Eastern Europe of the Black Sea) are Egyptian by race…I had conjectured as much myself from two pointers, firstly they have black skin and kinky hair…’

and again in a different instance he sugegsts:

‘…and when they add that the dove was black they give us to understand that the woman was Egyptian’

2. Aristotle -389 to -332 BCE

‘Those who are too black are cowards, like for instance the Egyptians and Ethiopians. But those who are excessively White are also coward as we can see from the example of women, the complexion of courage is between the two’

3. Lucian 125 -190 CE

‘ Lycinus: This boy is not merely black; he has thick lips and his legs are too thin…his hair worn in a plait behind shows that he is a freeman.

Timolaus: But that is a sign of really distinguished birth in Egypt, Lycinus…’

‘I can see the crew with their black limbs and white tunics’ taken from The Suppliants describing the Aegyptiads

5. Achilles Tatius of Alexandria

Same source as in 4, verse 745. He compares the herdsmen of the Delta to the Ethiopians that they are blackish

6. Strabo -58 BCE – 25 CE

He concurs in the theory that the Egyptians and Colchidians are of the same race (by a process of migration). Later he seeks elsewhere to explain why the Egyptians are darker than Hindus

7. Appollonius of Tyre

….describing Zeno son of Mnaseas or Demeas was a native of Citum in Cyprus says of him that he was gaunt, very tall and black, hence the fact according to

8. Chrysippus in the First Book of his Proverbs

Certain people called him an Egyptian vine shoot

9. Ammianus Marcellius 33- 100 CE Latin historian

‘…the men of Egypt are mostly brown or black with a skinny and dessicated look’.

With Marcellinius we reach the sunset of the Roman Empire and the end of classical antiquity. There are about 900 years between the birth of Aeschylus and Heredotus to the death of Marcellinus., 900 years during the Egyptians, amid a sea of white races steadily cross-bred.

It can be said that without exaggeration that in Egypt one household in ten included a White Asiaitic or Indo-European slave.

It is remarkable that, despite its itensity, all this crossbreeding should not have succeeeding in upsetting the racial constants..This cursory review of teh evidence of teh Graeco-Latin writers on the Egyptians’ race shows taht the extent of agreement between them is impressive and is an objective fact difficult to minimise or conceal….

However, don’t expect any revolutionary results concerning race. Since race isn’t a biological fact, it’s really difficult- or impossible- to reveal it using DNA testing.

The results could help us know a little more about his parents or his way of life. Maybe even his appearance. So perhaps it would be possible to make more accurate models of his appearance. So people could judge his features and decide whether he was black or mixed or brown. Remember, race is social. So whatever we may think of it, it’s not the same thing he thought about himself. His race was Egyptian.

“It is remarkable that, despite its itensity, all this crossbreeding should not have succeeeding in upsetting the racial constants..This cursory review of the evidence of the Graeco-Latin writers on the Egyptians’ race shows that the extent of agreement between them is impressive and is an objective fact difficult to minimise or conceal….

The results could help us know a little more about his parents or his way of life. Maybe even his appearance. So perhaps it would be possible to make more accurate models of his appearance. So people could judge his features and decide whether he was black or mixed or brown. Remember, race is social. So whatever we may think of it, it’s not the same thing he thought about himself. His race was Egyptian”.

There is another side to all this viz. that studying history in fact may paradoxically tell you more about the present than it does actually past, Something you spoke very well when you were speaking on bias (ie formulation of hypotheses etc).

So whatever the findings??

It is still possible for the investigator to say he believes that Tutankhamun looks like a present day ‘Arab’ (or like Hawas) himself. Its possible he could say the King was Caucasian and/or Black irrespective if race is social, and there was a different concept to race back then in history.

I think this is what people are waiting to hear…

What will he say about the King’s appearance/identity/race etc from a modern 21st century perspective, irrespective of all the other ambiguities, if you follow??

I am one of those people who believe it’s impossible to tell “how black was Ancient Egypt” (or any its people), because, well, race didn’t exist in their time.

What we think about Tuthankamon’s race is irrelevant to who he was and how he identified himself. It has nothing to do with studying Ancient Egypt.

On the other hand, in today’s world, race issues are important, so various scholars will- no doubt about it- try to prove his race was whatever they seem appropriate (Black scholars will claim his DNA proves he was black, Arabs that he was brown (Middle Eastern), whites that he was white). You can’t really prove any of these claims false, because race isn’t a biological fact.

I personally believe Ancient Egyptians looked like todays blacks mixed with Middle Eastern people- darker than Arabs (and certainly darker than “regular” whites- not that Arabs aren’t white, but you know what I mean), but lighter than blacks.

But it means nothing, absolutely nothing, because race didn’t exist as a concept in their time. In their time, there were only two groups of people: people (Egyptians) and foreigners (and there were 3 groups of foreigners: Aamu (Asiatic peoples- mainly from Levant), Nubians and Libyans). Egyptians wouldn’t want to be associated with Nubians or Asiatic people (in today’s meaning of the word: blacks and Arabs), so in that sense, claiming they were “black”, “brown” or “white” is an insult to them and it’s anachronistic.

“So whatever we may think of it, it’s not the same thing he thought about himself. His race was Egyptian.”

Finally this point is very important and again raises the issues on perspectives.

When we study ‘history’ (and we going back into that thing of social sciences)’. We are actually studying it from our ‘perspective’ and not from the agents we are studying

So for instance there are some individuals who like to take the identity of the ‘Moors’ (ie 20th century conception) but failing to realise or know that the Moors helped to destroy the Ghanian empire (16th century reality).

It can all be confusing sometime – but I think your point about him being Egyptian would be the correct definition, and one he would have given to himself if we could bring him here into the 21 century

I am one of those people who believe it’s impossible to tell “how black was Ancient Egypt” (or any its people), because, well, race didn’t exist in their time.

I do not know if you are aware of the African centred position of some regarding the issue of ‘race’.

Some would suggest ‘race’ is a reality but because of the destruction ‘race’ caused in World War 2 where Whites who up to then had suppressed the world on the basis of skin colour, now began supressing themselves.

And also because of the study of Egyptology slowly moving from the position that Egypt was a Caucasian civilization, then to a mixed civilization and now it is tentatively moving towards that it is an indigeneous ‘African society’ no different to any other on the continent…

Then these are some of the factors why some scholars want to move away from the concept of ‘race’.
Since in a way its a manoeuvre to still deny the humanity of Black people and keep them out of the history books…

I do not know if you are aware of the African centred position of some regarding the issue of ‘race’.

I am, in a way. For my last course on Ancient Egypt archaeology, I wrote a paper on Afrocentrism and its connections to studying Ancient Egypt.

I don’t deny race and its impact for the world in the past few centuries. Ancient Egypt should be recognized as an African civilization, and black (and non-black) kids all over the world should learn about its greatness in more honest light.

However, scholars (egyptologists, archaeologists, anthropologists, historians) should know better. They must know the difference between biological fact and social construct, for a start.

PS-Asking right questions and re-examining old concepts about past is always a good thing. Take Ancient Greece (my filed of work) for example. It’s taken for granted that this was the first European civilization, its cradle, and the base for modern western civilization. But was that really true? Was Ancient Greece European (in today’s sense of the word)? No way. I am not saying people of Ancient Greece wasn’t Caucasian (despite some Afrocentric claims, there aren’t any proofs of them not being white)- but they weren’t European in today’s sense of the word, and they wouldn’t like to be associated with some barbarians (today’s UK, Germany, America…)

J said:Then these are some of the factors why some scholars want to move away from the concept of ‘race’.
Since in a way its a maneuver to still deny the humanity of Black people and keep them out of the history books…
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Compared to other blogs I have seen about the race of ancient egyptians this one has more mature arguments and everyone seems willing to learn new things, I know I have. Some of the blogs on ancient egyptians get really nasty and racist and made me sick, i hope these mature debates continue. On the race of the ancient greeks I am no expert on this topic but I remember watching a documentary on the minoans of crete. There are paintings of brownish red skinned men holding hands with pale european women. One of the rulers of crete was potrayed with reddish brown skin. These were not reconstructions but paintings found on the walls. To me the style of paintings resembled that of the ancient egyptians. On the race of the ancient egyptians I understand Mira’s point about not being familiar with the jim crow laws.What annoys me is when some(not all) white american historians do not apply this rule when determing the race of the ancient egyptians. It makes me question their intentions. Despite having a white mother, most americans consider obama to be black. In the table of nations, even though the egyptians are lighter than the nubians they are much darker than obama or tiger woods and would be classified as african american. I also like the comment Mira made about greeks history being claimed by western europeans. This is exactly what happens. In america greek immigrants were looked down upon in the 19th and 20th centuries but their ancient history was quickly claimed by anglo saxons. Most hollywood movies use anglo saxons to play greeks or romans why do they do that? Is it not a method of stealing other people’s history like they do with ancient egypt?

On the race of the ancient greeks I am no expert on this topic but I remember watching a documentary on the minoans of crete.

Minoans of Crete were not Greeks and don’t have anything to do with them, except the fact Greeks adopted some of their culture.

There are paintings of brownish red skinned men holding hands with pale european women. One of the rulers of crete was potrayed with reddish brown skin. These were not reconstructions but paintings found on the walls. To me the style of paintings resembled that of the ancient egyptians.

Skin colour potrayed on paintings don’t mean much in determining one’s race, especially if you compare males and females in the same society. Males were always portrayed as darker; someone with “reddish brown skin” holding hands with “pale European woman” is not involved in an interracial relationship- it’s a woman of his own group.

Most hollywood movies use anglo saxons to play greeks or romans why do they do that? Is it not a method of stealing other people’s history like they do with ancient egypt?

Yes, but movies are not our main problem. When will British give back to Greeks many treasures they took from the Athens? Why would western Europeans and Americans claim Ancient Greece as cradle of their civilization, but still see today’s Greeks as somewhat inferior. Or, if you really want to talk about movies, why did Colin Farrel, of all people, played Alexander the Great? (Arguably, not a Greek, but he was horribly miscast. And then “some” people complained about actress who is part black playing Roxana).

Ancient Egyptians are more or less the same as modern Egyptians. Yes, there has been a lot of migration into Egypt from outside since ancient times. But if you look at a lot of modern Egyptians, they have a distinctive appearance that is similar to the ancient drawings and sculptures. Assassinated President Anwar El Sadat, for example, had those type of distinctive features. As abagond pointed out, Egyptians definitely qualify as black under the standard American definition.

However the links between the Nile Valley (Egypt, Nubia, etc.) and West Africa (where black Americans’ ancestors originated) are very tenuous. Afrocentric scholars who focus on Egypt are neglecting the history of other parts of the continent. I understand the appeal of ancient Egyptian history but there is more to African history than Egypt.

I know Egypt has been so romanticised in the west. The BBC had a series called The Lost Kingdoms of Africa the explored places like Nubia, Ethiopia, kingsoms in West Africa like the Benin empire and all that if was a really nice documentary. The thing that was repeated in the series was that the Europeans could not belive that they all of these wonderful artifacts were made by the so called “primitive dark backwards Africans.”

If the Egyptians are 40% black african and originated from the South in Ethiopia, I think the answer is clear. The Egyptians are, were, and have always been black. In fact, they’re as black as most African Americans I would say.

I don’t know if any of you have seen the Tut exhibit, but I have. I was just a kid when it rolled through Seattle, but let me tell you the busts of the folk looked just like the black people I’d been seeing all my life!

The lobby of the museum where they were selling the “look alike” merchandise of Tut however was a different story. Aqualine noses, pale skin. I was confused. Obviously there has been a concerted effort to downplay the “blackness” or Africaness of Egypt.

Take Ancient Greece (my filed of work) for example. It’s taken for granted that this was the first European civilization, its cradle, and the base for modern western civilization. But was that really true? Was Ancient Greece European (in today’s sense of the word)? No way. I am not saying people of Ancient Greece wasn’t Caucasian (DESPITE SOME AFROCENTRIC CLAIMS)…”

I don’t see what’s problem with that. I never said “Afrocentrics claim Greece was black”. I said that yes, some do not consider Greek people to be white (Caucasian). Also, some (including me) do not consider Greek civilization to be “European” in the western sense of the word (while geographically, yes, Greece is an European civilization). I don’t understand what’s the problem here.

The main “guilty as charged” here is Martin Bernal. True, the man never considered himself to be afrocentric, and as far as I can tell, you don’t consider him afrocentric either (is it because he’s white?) However, that doesn’t change the fact his ideas abut Egypt and Greece and considering history from African POV and can be view as Afrocentric.

Do you mind if I ask, are you a scholar or a just a person interested in afrocentrism? It’s not the same. I’m saying this not to attack you, but because it really seems you don’t understand how afrocentrism or eutrocentrism or any of the humanities work.

However, since you are interested in afrocentricm, I am sure you know Afrocentric is not a single movement or paradigm. Basically, all it means is “from African POV”. That’s all. (That is why some people suspect if black westerners, or Africans educated on the west/in western schools can truly be afrocentric). In any case, afrocentrism is, I am sure you know, not an uniform school of thought (thought you sometimes treat it as it is- same goes for eurocentrism). The topics discussed, methodology and conclusions are not uniform. What one afrocentric author says doesn’t have to be equal to what another afrocentric author says or claims. That doesn’t mean one of them is truly afrocentric while another is not. Also, while afrocentrism can be seen as political or ideological movement as well as scientific, I am only interested in the social science behind it, not politics or ideology (because our today’s ideology or politics are in no way connected with the Ancient world and archaeology). You, on the other hand, seem to be more itnerested in the other two aspects of it (politics and ideology). Nothing wrong with it, but it seems topics we are mostly concerned about are not the same. Hence, miscommunication.

I am not going to go into the finer details of what you say, since I believe that will move us away from the essnce of our dialogue.

The point I was trying to get at (as in my other post) is that many of those who are trained in euro-centred academia do not understand African centred thinking. I still believe this is the case, and so much of the critique lacks ‘academic rigour’, and also distortions of those arguments. Forgive me here like Afrocentrics suggesting Greek civilization is NOT a White/Cauasian phenomenon.

As for Bernal he is attempting to show the connection between Phonecian (hence Semetic) and Egyptian influence on Western civilization.

He says something more or less like this, if I can remember correctly, that up to a period of time (I think about 1800s) Western academia recognised the contribution of the aforesaid civilization as having a profound impact on Western civilization, even more than Greece.

However, with the ‘Aryan model’, as Bernal calls it. It was necessary for the West to move to only historical connections with those who were categorically classified as ‘White/Caucasian’ and hence starting the West from Greece – but it was not always this way, according to Bernal. It is because of racism that it was necessary to create a Western histiography starting from Greece

Bernal has described himself as NOT being an African centred scholar. However, because he suggested the Egyptians were ‘Africans’. As a result the mainstream believed he was suggesting that the Egyptians were ‘Black’.

Hence they referred and classified him as ‘afrocentric’ and also to ‘demean’ him.

The point I was trying to get at (as in my other post) is that many of those who are trained in euro-centred academia do not understand African centred thinking.

That’s why I’d love to hear your explanation. (This is not sarcasm). I am aware this is not a good place for it, so we can exchange a few emails, if you like. Abagond can give you my address. I am serious. I’d like to hear more about it. But like you said, I don’t think this topic is the right place for it.

Forgive me here like Afrocentrics suggesting Greek civilization is NOT a White/Cauasian phenomenon.

I didn’t understand this. As you know, I am not a native speaker, so I really don’t have a clue what you’re saying here. Could you explain?

As for Bernal he is attempting to show the connection between Phonecian (hence Semetic) and Egyptian influence on Western civilization.

Not only that, he argued there were colonists from Egypt (and Levant) that colonized Greece. While he never (as far as I can remember) explicitly said whether Egyptians were Caucasian or not, he did say they colonized early Greece. If you believe Egyptians weren’t Caucasian, this means Greeks weren’t either (they were mixed). Nothing wrong with being mixed, and nothing wrong with Greeks being part African- however, here’s the problem: we can’t find any proof of those colonizations. Cultural influence, yes. But not colonization.

However, with the ‘Aryan model’, as Bernal calls it. It was necessary for the West to move to only historical connections with those who were categorically classified as ‘White/Caucasian’ and hence starting the West from Greece – but it was not always this way, according to Bernal. It is because of racism that it was necessary to create a Western histiography starting from Greece

Exactly. According to him, in the past connections with Egypt were known and acknowledged. (He calls this “Ancient model”). But because of racism, colonialism and imperialism (since 18th century) European scholars either denied any cultural impact from Egypt, or acknowledged it, but claimed ancient Egyptians were white.

Bernal has described himself as NOT being an African centred scholar. However, because he suggested the Egyptians were ‘Africans’.

And what else could they be? Last time I checked, Egypt is not located in Scandinavia. Also, last time I checked, no “Aryans” (in lack of a better term) colonized Egypt in those days. What I do believe Egyptians weren’t as dark skinned as Nubians, but that doesn’t mean they were white. After all, no all black people have the same skin colour.

As for Bernal not thinking of himself as afrocentric- that doesn’t mean he is not afrocentric. Nothing wrong with that.

‘It was necessary for the West to move to only historical connections with those who were categorically classified as ‘White/Caucasian’ and hence starting the West from Greece – but it was not always this way, according to Bernal. It is because of racism that it was necessary to create a Western histiography starting from Greece”

Speaking of which J, have you read the book; “Ancient Egypt in Africa”?

I purchased the ebook version and have read the chapter by Bernal. Just started reading it. If you haven’t here is a link:

From the abridged parts from the link I gave you ,this looks like a very good book. Good in the sense that it is at the forefront of the ‘paradigm (theory) change’ regarding
Egypt/culture etc and this is from a Western centred perspective.

1. Most Euro-centred scholars have NOT in fact studied the African centred position. What they have done is merely to object to the fact that Blacks are claiming what White people behaves is theirs. Its not an academic issue but one of ideology

1b. This is why African centred ideas are often mis-construed (irrespective if there are many variants). It is in the interest of the ‘powers that be’ to mis-construe and ‘mis-represent’ African centred perspectives, like Blacks were the founders of the classic Greece civilisation

2. As for Bernal I don’t think he is arguing that Egypt colonised Greece (again the type of ‘mis-conception). He suggests there was ‘contact’ between Egyptian/Phoenicians in the Levant region citing the historical records. So for instance the Greek alphabet is derived from Phoenician alphabet.

3. With regard to what else could the Egyptians be? History reveals to us that they are the ‘White Hamites’ who managed to create EVERY SINGLE civilisations on the African continent because Blacks were incapable (sic)

4. Bernal said he is NOT afrocentric because he is NOT an African centred scholar. It is not his really his aim to show that Egypt is a Black civilization.

2. As for Bernal I don’t think he is arguing that Egypt colonised Greece (again the type of ‘mis-conception). He suggests there was ‘contact’ between Egyptian/Phoenicians in the Levant region citing the historical records. So for instance the Greek alphabet is derived from Phoenician alphabet.

I got the same impression from reading the Bernal article in the book. This is what happens when ‘conservative’ whites write ‘afrocentrist’ books.

I enjoyed reading the book! The first link is to a blog responding to this book. The irony is that the author is a conservative writer otherwise. Yet they have accused him of being an under-cover Marxist! I guess they find his premise threatening. I would recommend this book.

As for the other books I downloaded? ‘Ancient Perspectives on Egypt’, ‘Never had the Like Occurred”-Egypts view of its past. Don’t laugh, the John Carter of Mars series from Edgar Rice Burroughs. There seems to be tons of books, articles, thesis, from that site. Oh, I forgot, I also downloaded an article about ancient Nubia/Cush being the precursor for Ancient Egypt. I believe that archeological digs are starting to prove this. It is no coincidence that the built the Aswan Dam thereby destroying many sites!

I just skimmed over it and the words under-cover Marxist jumped out at me. They levelled this as an insult the same way some call anyone who espouses Ancient Egypt as a black civilization as afrocentric. It is as you state, Bernal doesn’t consider himself to be an afrocentrist. However, let the evidence speak for itself. The poster who said that the Arabs didn’t arrive in Egypt until 7 AD, tell that to Hawass who claims that they were there since Egypts inception! LOL! The Ancient Greeks referred to Africa as ‘Ethiopia’.

Well, given the history of the region, I wouldn’t be surprised if they had some black admixturehowever small coming from the Ottoman Turks, or is it the Arabs? Maybe to them the two are mutually exclusive. Now ownder Turkey is having a hard time getting into the Eupopean Union. If the Greeks have their way they won’t!

I was joking a little there. But seriously, there must have been admixture between the Turks and the Greeks, much the same as between the Mongols and the rest of the people in the Mongol Empire. Those clowns on that blog know this and are pi##ed off about it, LOL.

One thing that kinda bugs me is the assumption that the Egyptians had to have one dominant homogeneous phenotype. (As in, black, white, half-black and half-white, etc).

I see ancient Egyptians as being a mixed population, not just in the sense of looking like mixed black-and-white, but that there may well have been all kinds of degrees of admixture. Particularly if you consider that Egypt links two land masses, so there was probably a fair amount of movement back and forth.

Consider also, the kind of people called “black” in America today – it includes people who look like Prince or Alicia Keys and people who look like Wesley Snipes. That’s quite a range of phenotypes and genotypes – “black” is in this sense more about social construction rather than genetic classification.

I imagine ancient Egypt would have contained a variety of people, some looking like Southern Europeans, some looking like sub-Saharan Africans, and probably most looking more or less like modern Egyptians, perhaps with a little more “blackness” in their phenotype.

Another thing to consider is the descriptions of Egyptians as being “black” by writers of other ancient cultures.

While it may well have been an apt description, consider also that in many parts of the world, “black” is a term used for people who are not black in the sense that Americans would necessarily understand it.

Maori in New Zealand have often been referred to as black, as have Indians and Pakistanis, even thought their skin colour is often quite light.

So the term “black” when used by light-skinned people can sometimes refer to people who are darker than they, but by no means very dark.

South Asians often refer to themselves as “brown” in contrast to “black” people; yet many South Asians are much darker than “black” people.

With regard to the issue of race, we must NOT conflate our categories of today with that of the past.

For instance in the past the population of the Indian sub-continent were considered as Ethiopians by the Greeks.

Today they would NOT be classified as such. Nor would someone of Indian descent today classify himself as such, and probably many would never have been aware of such politics.

When we speak of a mixed Egyptian population, we are often caught up in Eurocentic thinking, that Blacks only have wooly hair and full lips.

However, some of the Blacks of Ethiopia, Somalia are also Black too, even if they do not fit the stereotype.

As for the opulation of SE Asia it is agreed that the Semang (Malaysia), Aeta (Phillipines) who are ‘Black’ were its irst inhabitants long before the ‘Mongoloid’ population.

Finally on the issue of race, even though it may be a ‘superfluous’ term. It is possible, in my opinion to say the Egyptians looked like ‘White Canadians’, ‘Black Barbadians or ‘Han Chinese” and so forth

And just one other thing. just to complicate matters there are Blacks Sudanese ‘darker’ than most Blacks who do NOT see themselves as African but rather Arabs.

If we being honest ColorofLuv and this is why I asked Mira my question, about whether the Greeks were Whites/Caucasians??

All we can say, especially if we begin to use the ‘hardline semantics’ that is applied to the populace of Egypt elsewhere to ‘world’ and in particular ‘Western history’ is that the Irish are descended from ‘Celts’.

There is no ‘proof’ of them being ‘White’, ‘dark’ etc that I know of, or perhaps you may want to correct me here.

To J – I agree with you. I am not aware of “proof”, but I will do some digging. I believe it is a matter of semantics. I will try and get some more info.

Also been looking more into the Scots-Irish. (Found out there not the same as the “true” Irish either, but I digress before derailing another blog.)

As for the Greeks, Southern Europeans, Meditteranean ‘folk’, if one could play social experiments in time: Plop any random segment of population from any particular ethnic group, from any given area, at any time in history – into the Jim Crow south, my bet is that”Southern Segregated” america would categorize said group as indeed “Black”. —

I mean, we all came out of Africa and share the same forefather, right? If specific phenotypes recognizable today only STARTED appearing 20,000 years ago, then ………….. ?

Bernal did say Egypt and Levant colonized Greece. At least in “Black Athena”. I am not sure if he changed his opinion on this later, but yes, he did propose two types of contact between Egypt and Greece: influence and colonization. I agree on the influence, but colonization? I am afraid we don’t have any proof on this, nor did he have any proof. Egyptians never wrote anything about it, and they were never shy of talking about lands they colonized. Also, there’s nothing in the material sources that can be taken as a proof of colonization. The only source we got are, in fact, Greek sources (mainly Herodotus), who wrote about Egyptian colonization. But archaeologists were unable to find anything to support this. Herodotus is a very valuable source, but as a historical source, he’s pretty unreliable. The value of his work is more in the area of anthropology and ethnography.

And now about the Greeks.

Do you believe the ancient Greeks were White/Caucasian, and if so why? If not why not?? And how would you classify them personally??

Ancient Greeks, like Egyptians, lived in a time when race as a social category didn’t exist. Therefore, calling them “white”, “black”, “mixed” or whatever is anachronistic. Greek made distinction between “us” and “them” based on language. If you didn’t speak Greek, you were a barbarian (usually read as: lesser being). There are, however, two notable exceptions: foreigners who were, technically, barbarians (didn’t speak Greek language), but were considered “civilized” (not the word they used, but hope you understand what I mean): Egyptians and Romans.

But if we try to determine race of Greek population as viewed today, hmmm…. Well, geographically, they are in Europe. If there was any significant mix from Africa in the past (after the general “out of Africa” in prehistory), we don’t know about it. Maybe there was, but like I said, I am not sure if I buy Bernal’s argument about colonization. On the other hand, there are more evidence of colonization from the north (Balkans), so I think we could say Greek people were Caucasian. To me, Caucasian means white, but I’d say they were not “Aryan” (blonde, blue eyed, really light skinned) Caucasians. They were, I guess, more of what is considered (even today) “Mediterranean” or “dark Caucasians”. As far as I understand, some westerners argue whether those people are truly white or not. (But like I said, to me, all Caucasians belong to the same race- white).

If we take a look at their art and the way they represent themselves- well, it can be used as a proof- or not, depending on how you see it. First of all, we don’t know if they tried to present themselves realistically. Sometimes, the style used determined the colour of the figures (on pottery, red pottery with black figures had figures painted black. But hair and beard was, in that case, painted red/light. Other style, light figures on dark were light with dark hair and beard). There’s no indication those weren’t the same people.

Personally, I imagine them as Caucasians. (dark Caucasians). Hair thick and dark, dark eyes, olive skin. If there was some African blood in them, it wasn’t recent to make them biracial (in a way of one black parent or even grandparent).

For some reason, I don’t think they look that much different than the modern Greeks- which might not be a good approximation. However, we know what colonial westerners thought of them (Greek people in 18th and 19th century)- they were dark. They were not black, but they were way too dark to be considered acceptable. In the colonial days, when west became crazy about Ancient Greece, and Ancient Greece became “cradle of European civilization”, many westerners visiting Greece (then under Ottoman rule) were disappointed to see those “dirty dark ugly Greek peasants”. It’s impossible that those people were true descendants of those noble, white Greeks that gave us philosophy, art and civilizations.

So, those dark peasants, westerners thought, are not true “children” of those noble Ancient Greeks- we are! So they stole monuments and took them to England or wherever because they thought they belong to them, not to Greek peasants (who were unable to say no, because they were under Turks who didn’t care about those monuments).

The problem though is if we utilise the ‘hardline semantic’ as regarding Egyptian populace then I think it is ‘impossible’ to say what ‘race’ they (the Greeks) belong to??

Especially when you go a bit further and note that the Greeks are derived from the Hellas (Hellenes) but we do NOT know much about these people. Whether Greece is in Europe or not I believe is ‘unhelpful’ in deciding if they are White/Caucasians

As for the word ‘colony’ ‘colonialist’, ‘colonisers’ of the Aegean region. I do not think Bernal has the idea that the Egyptians ‘colonised’ these areas as say the English ‘colonised’ Australia.

Personally I thought it was readily accepted as a ‘fact’ that there was a Phonecian/Egyptian presence in areas like
the Aegean etc that without a doubt had an ‘influence’ on Greece

“Discoveries of scarabs and other Egyptian objects made at Mycenae, Ialysus, Vaphio, and others. with the 18th Dynasty (ca. 1600-1400 BC). While in Egypt itself, Refti tributaries, bearing vases of Aegean form, and themselves similar in fashion of dress and arrangement of hair to figures on Cretan frescoes and gems , are depicted under this and the succeeding Dynasties (e.g. Rekhmara tomb at Thebes).

Actual vases of late Minoan style have been found with remains of the 18th Dynasty, while in the Aegean area itself was evidence of a great wave of Egyptian influence beginning with this same Dynasty, such as the Nilotic scenes depicted on the Mycenae daggers, on fresco and other artefacts”.

The problem though is if we utilise the ‘hardline semantic’ as regarding Egyptian populace then I think it is ‘impossible’ to say what ‘race’ they (the Greeks) belong to??

Correct. It’s impossible to say what “race: Greeks belonged to. The issue of their race is anachronistic and can’t truly be discussed because it makes no sense. But you asked for my opinion, and since imagining ancient people (or historical populations) is not something I can prevent, I told you what image of them I have in my mind. I also answered about the image I have of Egyptians.

Especially when you go a bit further and note that the Greeks are derived from the Hellas (Hellenes) but we do NOT know much about these people.

What do you mean we don’t know much about these people? Are you referring to the original population of Ancient Greeece? Or classical Ancient Greek populations? We do know a lot about them. Well, “a lot” is relative, of course. We know as much as we do about other people. Where did any world population come from? Eastern Africa (as far as we know). But it’s not the point here, I believe.

As for the word ‘colony’ ‘colonialist’, ‘colonisers’ of the Aegean region. I do not think Bernal has the idea that the Egyptians ‘colonised’ these areas as say the English ‘colonised’ Australia.

No, he did mean colonize, as: our people go there, take that territory, live there and mix with natives. So, the only difference I see is that English people weren’t so eager to mix with natives and the quantity- there were more English colonists than the Egyptian/Phoenican ones. Like I said, I don’t know if Bernal changed his mind about this in his later books, but that’s what he proposed in “Black Athena”.

Personally I thought it was readily accepted as a ‘fact’ that there was a Phonecian/Egyptian presence in areas like
the Aegean etc that without a doubt had an ‘influence’ on Greece

Yes. Egyptian presence in the Aegean is the known fact. But “Aegean” and “Greece” is not the same thing. Bernal wasn’t talking about the presence in the Aegean, but about the actual colonization on the north- as north as Black sea, and in Greece as well. Some of those colonies were Phoenican, but, according to him, there was also Egyptian presence in Greece.

Actual vases of late Minoan style have been found with remains of the 18th Dynasty, while in the Aegean area itself was evidence of a great wave of Egyptian influence beginning with this same Dynasty, such as the Nilotic scenes depicted on the Mycenae daggers, on fresco and other artefacts”.

J, you seem to see “Aegean” and “Greece” as the same thing. It isn’t. Minoan civilization has nothing to do with Greece. Those people were not Greek. It’s not the same thing. Yes, Greece is in Aegean region and it is one of the Aegean cultures, but it began relatively late in comparison to other Aegean cultures.

Also, Minoan civilization and Mycenae is not the same thing. Mycenae culture is considered to be the first Greek culture. And yes, there are plenty of evidence of contact between early Greeks (Myceane) and Egypt. It still doesn’t mean “colonization”, it means “contact”. Plus, colonization Bernal was talking about was (if it was) even earlier, before Mycenae.

I am trying to take into account that we do not know much about the Hellenes and where they originate from.

As the ancestors of the Greeks they would be one and the same ‘people’. However, this cannot be deduced from academia.

Hence I am conflating many issues, Greece, Minoan civilisation – if they are viewed as a precusor of the Greeks.

This is why I make reference to Aegean and the Greeks.

So the essence of my point, although we may know ‘more about’ Greek civilisation 3rd century AD, but very little is known about their origins. Since there is NOT much detail on their origins, this is why I am alluding to Aegean and Levant (in an earlier post).

This is the essence of the point I am getting at and not minute details on Aegean.

And again with regard to Bernal. I thought he was charting the influence on Greece from around 1400 B.C up to Greek civilisation 330 BC, for Phoneician and Egypt to a greater extent, amongst other things.

As the ancestors of the Greeks they would be one and the same ‘people’. However, this cannot be deduced from academia.

We do not know much about Pelasgians, the first people that lived in mainland Greece. They were, presumably, autochthonous. At least that’s how later Greeks thought of them. They also saw them as “primitive” and inferior (which is not surprising- colonizers always say those they colonize are inferior). If Bernal’s theory of colonization was correct, Egypt/Levant colonized them (Pelasgians). If this is, indeed true, they could be part African. We are not sure if Pelasgians were Indo-European or not, we don’t know what language they spoke. We don’t know how they looked like. Meanwhile, there was strong culture on Crete (Minoan), as well as on the Aegean islands (Cyclades).

Enter Mycenaeans. Those are the first Greeks- that is, first people who spoke Greek. They are considered to be Indo-Europeans. They appeared in the mainland in the 17th century BC (some say in 20th century BC)- for all we know, from the north. Where from north, we have no idea. Those people spoke Greek language and established what is known as Mycenaean civilization in the Bronze Age. Those are Greeks that fought against Troy. They established strong connections with the East and South (Levant and Egypt). They were pretty strong till about 1100.

What happened then (beginning of the Iron Age) is the main theme of my research. It’s particularly interesting because historians and archaeologist disagree on what was going on. Historians base their research on written sources, and talk about Dorian invasion from the north that happened around 1100. Wild Dorians came and destroyed Mycenaean centres. Dorians were inferior in culture to Mycenaeans so it was a bad time for Greece. First of all, they were illiterate. So writing didn’t exist in that dark age. When there are no written sources, historians are unable to say anything, because they work with written sources. And there was none. So, they say, it was a dark age. All contacts with East and South were lost and it was a horrible time.

Archaeologists disagree. They work with material sources- and there are plenty of material sources in the Iron age, that show that this time was not as horrible as once looked. First of all, they started producing iron weapons (working with iron is not easy). Also, it was the time society changed in a way that made later city states (that classical Greece is famous for) possible. Also, it is the time Homeric poems were shaped, and along with it large corpus of Greek mythology. And guess what- contacts with East and South were not completely lost, they were different.

Later, around 800 BC we see more and more contacts once again. And another thing- emergence of Greek alphabet, heavily influenced by Phoenican. But it was not the same as the first Greek writing, Liner B even though the language was the same (well, not the same of course, Mycenaean was early Greek, but still Greek language).

Sorry for this long info. I just wanted to point out the difference between Pelazgi, Minonas (from Crete), Mycenaeans and classical Greeks.

Hence I am conflating many issues, Greece, Minoan civilisation – if they are viewed as a precusor of the Greeks.

Minoan civilization is seen as a precursor of the Greeks- but according to who, you might ask? Eurocentric scholars. They see Minoans, who were neither Indo-European (for all we know) nor Greek (we do know) – as some sort of “early Greeks” or something. This is not the best way to go. Minoan civilization is one thing, Mycenaean is another. Those are not the same people.

“Enter Mycenaeans. Those are the first Greeks- that is, first people who spoke Greek. They are considered to be Indo-Europeans”

Not every one accepts that they are Indo-Europeans and if we use the same ‘hardline semantic’ as with Egypt. It cannot be demonstrated otherwise that they were in fact so.

And as for Linear A and B scripts…One of those scripts has not been deciphered as of yet??. There are some scholars who suggest that they may be not connected to Indo-Europeans language if I have remembered correctly

Not every one accepts that they are Indo-Europeans and if we use the same ‘hardline semantic’ as with Egypt. It cannot be demonstrated otherwise that they were in fact so.

Their language is accepted to be Indo-European. Since Indo-Europeans are usually regarded as “those who speak Indo-European languages”, Mycenaeans are regarded as Indo-Europeans. Their language is proved to be early Greek. They are first Greeks.

And as for Linear A and B scripts…One of those scripts has not been deciphered as of yet??. There are some scholars who suggest that they may be not connected to Indo-Europeans language if I have remembered correctly.

First things first: You are correct, one of the scripts has not been deciphered as of yet: Linear A. Minoans (from Crete) used it. We still don’t know anything about their lanugage and the script they used (Linear A) has not been deciphered. Because we don’t know their language. And as far as we know, it was not Indo-European.

Mycenaeans spoke Greek and used Linear B script. They formed the script with the influence of Minoans (and Linear A), but they used it for their own language (Greek). Just like they later formed their alphabet using Phoenican one to write the same language. Linear B was deciphered in the 50s and it was proved it was used to record an early form of Greek language, but Greek language nevertheless.

Sure. 🙂 Unfortunately, I think we’re getting a bit off topic here. Maybe Abagond could write “how white (black) was Ancient Greece” post, so we could discuss this further.

Meanwhile, here’s and article called “Black Greeks” I found. I am still reading it, so I have no idea how scientific/afrocentric/eurocentric it is, but it talks about Bernal and I can see several example of pottery with black figures (argued to present black people, I assume), so let’s take a look at it together:

Personally I don’t think we are getting off topic at all and this brings me nicely to my point, viz. If the same ‘hardline semantic’ that is used for Egypt is then applied to Western civilization (including Romans/Etruscans). What will you find that it is ‘impossible’ to classify these peoples as
‘White/Caucasian’

It is the ‘hardline semantic’ (along with the antecedent of racism) that makes it so difficult to classify Egypt as a Black/African civilization like any other on the continent,
and for Abagond to ask the question ‘ How Black Was Ancient Egypt’ as many others have asked also.
However the hardline semantic is never reversed with regard to Western/White civilizations (mutatis mutandis)

With regard to Clyde A. Winters, I had sent you a link regarding him already on this page. His work is very African-centred

I don’t remember the link! Are you use I said I’d read it. I guess I missed it- I’ll try to find it.

I already said it’s impossible to classify Ancient Greeks as white. I don’t see any problem with it. The more interesting question I ask here is- whether it was an European civilization? Geographically, the answer is simple- it was. But in other meanings of the word?

The next thing wee need to ask: what is considered to be an European civilization? Geographically European? Established and practiced by white people? Or western civilization?

In practice, many people see it as “western” civilization- which makes no sense. How much today’s western civilization is based on Ancient Greece is besides the point. It tells nothing about the actual Ancient Greece. In that sense, Greece was a culture that had many important contacts with both South and barbaric North.

As for a blog post, “how white was Ancient Greece” would be an excellent idea. I already said it. And don’t think people didn’t ask this already- like I said, 18th century Englishmen didn’t really see modern Greeks as particularly white or worthy to be children of such a superior civilization as Ancient Greece.

And back to the link I gave. I didn’t read the whole article (I have to finish it before I form my opinion), but for now, it looks like a mess. A mess with good intentions, perhaps, but still a mess. Person who wrote it can’t tell the difference between Minoans and Mycenaeans and images he used as an examples are taken, it seems, randomly, from different periods (one example is from 15th century BC, then another from 8th century, then again one from 12th century). You can’t do it like that- either present them chronologically or following another principle, but a principle.

All in all, this is the first thing that caught my attention:

The Eurocentrists attempt to prove there was “considerable cultural and linguistic continuity from the twelfth century to the eight century BC” ,in the Aegean . Yet there is no way it can be proven that Indo-European Greeks have always been in Greece. This view on the continuity between the Linear B Greeks and later Greeks held by Lefkowitz is disputed by Hopper who noted that ” after all, so much which characterizes Minoan Crete seems wholly alien to later Greece, despite the efforts of scholars to detect ‘continuity’ ” .

Slow down, slow down. One thing at a time. There is argued to be considerable linguistic continuity because language was the same. Culture wasn’t- that’s the whole point.

Also, they say “is no way it can be proven that Indo-European Greeks have always been in Greece.” Of course there is no way. In fact, there are proofs that Greeks were NOT always been in Greece, they came later. This is not a mystery or a less known fact.

Also: “disputed by Hopper who noted that ” after all, so much which characterizes Minoan Crete seems wholly alien to later Greece, despite the efforts of scholars to detect ‘continuity’ ” – doesn’t make any sense. Of course Mionan Crete was “alien to later Greece”- that was not the same culture! Mionans were not Greek, those are not the same people, and I don’t know why author of the article thinks Minoans are Greek.

With regard to Greek being a European civilisation, how can it be classified as such when the Europe had NOT even existed then.

If anything Greece was tied to Africa via Egypt and the Middle East

With regard to your position on the ‘race’ of te Geeks. You had already given your views of what you thought they were White/Caucasian. So would you like to clarify??

Finally as for the part you cited and quoted from C.A. Winters. I have not read the article, but what you quoted I had alsways thought that was the Euro-centred position. Obviously not everyone who is Western/euro-centred would off course adopt this position, but some would.

I do not see anything wrong with what C.A Winters has cited in this respect. He is quoting what HE believes is the position of Eurocentred scholars – but this is NOT his position.

And I read the C.A Winters piece, from my little knowledge on the subject I do not see much wrong with it.

You will see also that CA Winters disagrees that Bernal is also an Afrocentric point.

My point on raising this whole subject today is to show if the same ‘criteria’ is extended to Greece as it is/has been for Egypt. Then it would be impossible to say anthing about the race and/or phenotypes of Greeks, Roman, Irish
etc (mutatis mutandis)

With regard to Greek being a European civilisation, how can it be classified as such when the Europe had NOT even existed then.

True, that can be said too. Europe didn’t exit. Still, if we want to classify it geographically by today’s standards (which is usually done), we can say Greek civilization was located mainly in Europe. But not just in Europe, since there were cities on other continents.

But yes, you are correct, it’s impossible to say Ancient Greece was European since Europe did not exist.

If anything Greece was tied to Africa via Egypt and the Middle East

Of course. Those were more civilized (so to speak) parts of the world, not the barbaric European mainland. Still, Greece had many contacts with barbarians as well.

But it is also besides the point, since Africa and Middle East didn’t exist as concepts back then.

With regard to your position on the ‘race’ of te Geeks. You had already given your views of what you thought they were White/Caucasian. So would you like to clarify??

No, I said I imagine them as modern Greeks, more or less. It’s not something I like (imagining ancient people), because I consider this to be counter productive. But it’s not something I can consciously prevent. Also, what I know about Greeks, and what I see in their art doesn’t conflict with that image, so it stuck, I guess.

Finally as for the part you cited and quoted from C.A. Winters. I have not read the article, but what you quoted I had alsways thought that was the Euro-centred position. […] I do not see anything wrong with what C.A Winters has cited in this respect. He is quoting what HE believes is the position of Eurocentred scholars – but this is NOT his position.

I understand it’s not his position. I don’t know if he misinterpreted Eurocentc scholars, or he chose to cite authors who know nothing about the subject- but there are many huge mistakes in the passage I cited. Material errors, such as implying Minoans were Greek.

You will see also that CA Winters disagrees that Bernal is also an Afrocentric point.

Yes, I understand that: he doesn’t see Bernal as Afrocentric, because Bernal said it was Semitic Hyksos those who colonized Greece. But as far as I remember Bernal (and I am sure I do remember him), he also argued other Egyptian influence and colonization on Greece, not just Hyksos. Whether he thought Egyptians were black or not, I don’t remember.

My point on raising this whole subject today is to show if the same ‘criteria’ is extended to Greece as it is/has been for Egypt. Then it would be impossible to say anthing about the race and/or phenotypes of Greeks, Roman, Irish etc (mutatis mutandis)

Of course not. It is impossible to say anything about race of the Greeks, and their phenotypes (genetics) can only be guessed or argued (usually using art). But that is all.

But what we should ask here is not “were X black/white” but “why is important to determine if X were black/white”?

PS-It’s late now, and I didn’t have time to finish reading the article, but I’ll do it and post my comments here.

Just to say Africa (in the sense of Egypt) and Persia/Iraq
or by whatever name you want to call them did exist.

When I say Europe did NOT exist then I am referring to the geo-political entity.

This is the essence of my point.

With regard to Greek civilization much of it is influenced by Phoenicia and Egypt and this was the ‘impetus’ of their
civilization. NOT other areas of Europe which did not have that ‘high culture’ at that time.

I am not sure of your point that the ancient Greeks look like modern Greeks, since modern Greeks are ‘White Caucasian’ as you describe, when you said:

“On the other hand, there are more evidence of colonization from the north (Balkans), so I think we could say Greek people were Caucasian. To me, Caucasian means white, but I’d say they were not “Aryan” (blonde, blue eyed, really light skinned) Caucasians. They were, I guess, more of what is considered (even today) “Mediterranean” or “dark Caucasians”.

Just to say Africa (in the sense of Egypt) and Persia/Iraq
or by whatever name you want to call them did exist.

Africa as a geo-political entity didn’t exist. Egypt did exist, in what’s called Africa today. Persia didn’t exist back then (it came a bit later), in what is today’s Iran, not Iraq (and spread from there).

With regard to Greek civilization much of it is influenced by Phoenicia and Egypt and this was the ‘impetus’ of their
civilization.

Nobody denies influence (or contact). But I am not so sure about actual colonization. There’s no proof of it.

I am not sure of your point that the ancient Greeks look like modern Greeks, since modern Greeks are ‘White Caucasian’ as you describe, when you said:

“On the other hand, there are more evidence of colonization from the north (Balkans), so I think we could say Greek people were Caucasian. To me, Caucasian means white, but I’d say they were not “Aryan” (blonde, blue eyed, really light skinned) Caucasians. They were, I guess, more of what is considered (even today) “Mediterranean” or “dark Caucasians”.

What’s confusing about this? I said that we don’t know much about the earliest (neolitic) populations in today’s Greece, but we know about people from the north who settled there later. Those people were, as far as we know, Caucasian. They spoke Indo-European language. They didn’t live there from the beginning, but they mixed with the natives and they created Mycenaean civilization. There’s evidence of later colonizations from the north. All of this happened in Bronze and Iron age- much before the classical Greece which is the most famous.

Also, I said I imagine them as Caucasians, more or less like today’s Greeks. This might not be a proper image, but it’s the one I got. Greek art doesn’t conflict with this view. How do you imagine Ancient Greeks? How about Egyptians?

Persia (in the Sept. persis, in the Achæmenian inscriptions Parsa, in Elamitic Parsin, in modern Persian Fars, and in Arabic Fars, or Fâris) was originally the name of a province in Media, but afterwards — i.e., towards the beginning of the fifth century B.C. — it became the general name of the whole country formerly comprising Media, Susiana, Elam, and even Mesopotamia (viz Iraq)

As for Persia: Persians did expand their rule on Mesopotamia (and, in some periods, Anadolia and Egypt), but generally considered, “Persia” was today’s Iran, not Iraq. And btw, Persians were also Indo-Europeans, not Semites.

As for Persia: Persians did expand their rule on Mesopotamia (and, in some periods, Anadolia and Egypt), but generally considered, “Persia” was today’s Iran, not Iraq. And btw, Persians were also Indo-Europeans, not Semites

Just for clarification we are speaking if the term existed or not in ancient times. I posted the refernce to show that they had…

As for Persia being Indo-European. If we are not merely playing with words (here terma). the issue of the ‘problem of language’.

What you will see is that Elam (or specifically the region of Persia/Iran or by any other such name) was NOT Indo-European depending on what period of history one is referring to.

Its a similar thing with Mesopotamia that ONLY became ‘Semetic’ around c. 2,400 BC

With regard to your question Abagond, before I logged on to your page I thought I would give you a reason of my position.

Only to find you had already asked the question and clarified your own position.

I guess I must have been ‘defensive’ in my outlook, when I responded the way I did.

No-one really believes that Greek civilization was NOT White/Caucasian phenomena.

Its only through a ‘manipulative distortion’ of Afrocentricism that individuals might believe that African centred scholars are suggesting that ‘Greek is NOT a European civilization’

I think if you did the blog it would be a sort of ‘tautology’.
it could well be the equivalent of creating a blog about ‘King Alfred Plan’ and discussing as if it is ‘TRUE’ but NOT as the ‘URBAN MYTH’ that it is.

Perhaps if you are keen to do a post on it. Then comments made earlier could give you something to work with

It is the ‘hardline semantic’ (along with the antecedent of racism) that makes it so difficult to classify Egypt as a Black/African civilization like any other on the continent,
and for Abagond to ask the question ‘ How Black Was Ancient Egypt’ as many others have asked also.

**********However the hardline semantic is never reversed with regard to Western/White civilizations (mutatis mutandis)*******

So you could ask the following:

What if Westerm/euro-centred academia applied the same ‘tests’ such as there is no such thing as race, the artwork not being representative, words having a different meaning in the past and so forth to Ancient Greece, would they be able to identify it as White/Caucasian civilization??

Now this question/issue would be more on point, in my opinion and also reveal the disingenuousness of the processes at hand

Right, that was my thinking. And in addition the history of Greece’s whiteness, something I think Herneith commented on: it was not till the late 1700s that anyone thought to even call Greece “white”. And add into that the experience of Greeks in America in regard to race (though maybe they did not have much trouble because Italians came before them and helped to extend the meaning of “white” into the darker hues).

And again to make the issue more confusing when we speak of ‘Greece civilization’ we are speaking of a conglomerate of people divided over city-states like Sparta,
Macedonia

Alexander the Great father was not born in Greece but Macedonia

With regards to your comments Abagond I think this time period falls into the category of ‘Nordic and/or Teutonic supremacy’. When the Western world following Gobineau began to classify ALL Whites people by race prior to that only people with color has that ‘privilege’ bestowed upon them

And again to make the issue more confusing when we speak of ‘Greece civilization’ we are speaking of a conglomerate of people divided over city-states like Sparta,
Macedonia

Alexander the Great father was not born in Greece but Macedonia

In essence, you are right: we should determine what “Greece” means first. That’s the first mistake Winters’ made in that article.

But you are wrong about Macedonia: Macedonia isn’t in Greece. It’s never regarded as Greece. Macedonia was not a city state. Alexander was not Greek, he was Macedonian. Well, his father was Macedonian and his mother was from Epirus. None of them was Greek. Macedonians adopted Greek culture, but they were not Greeks. So whenever you talk about Hellenism and Hellenistic period, you are, in fact, not talking about “Ancient Greece” in its general meaning of the word.

Now, about:

*However the hardline semantic is never reversed with regard to Western/White civilizations (mutatis mutandis)

This is not true. “How white was Greece” was a relevant topic (and I guess it still is), but it was concluded, like in the case of Egypt, that is impossible to apply modern notions of race into the past since “race” is not biological- it’s a social construct that didn’t exist back then. In that sense, the only thing we can argue is whether particular ancient group would be seen as white TODAY, but even that doesn’t mean much, since different cultures have different ideas about who’s white and who’s black and who’s brown.

What if Westerm/euro-centred academia applied the same ‘tests’ such as there is no such thing as race, the artwork not being representative, words having a different meaning in the past and so forth to Ancient Greece, would they be able to identify it as White/Caucasian civilization??

Like I said, it is concluded that is impossible to identify Greece as White civilization. It is not a secret, or a controversial issue.

And about Persia:

What you will see is that Elam (or specifically the region of Persia/Iran or by any other such name) was NOT Indo-European depending on what period of history one is referring to.

True, Elamites were not Indo-European. But when I said “Persia”, I meant on Ancient Persia (Achaemenid Empire), since I thought we were talking about that period of ancient history.

@Abagond

And in addition the history of Greece’s whiteness, something I think Herneith commented on: it was not till the late 1700s that anyone thought to even call Greece “white”.

This is interesting and probably has a lot to do with the way westerners view “whiteness” and who is truly European and who is not. Like I already said, western Europeans did not see modern Greeks as “one of them”- not just “one of them”, but not even “descendants of Ancient Greeks”. Race is, as far as I know, never mentioned, but modern Greeks were not seen as “fully European and worthy of Ancient Greece”.

Westerners (WASPs) had (have?) this twisted image of Ancient Greeks as being noble, wise, and, well, white. White not like your average Greek (Mediterranean type), but – I don’t know- white as marble, white as WASPs, I guess. If you see their culture as cradle of your civilization, you will start imagining them as yourself (your people), because you believe only your “kind of people” are intelligent and superior.

I don’t know about Greeks in America, whether they were regarded as white or not- it is interesting to hear more about it.

All in all, I believe “How white was Ancient Greece” is an interesting idea for a post. Obviously, there’s a lot to discuss about it (even though we all know the answer: “it’s impossible to determine and the question is anachronistic”).

I’ll save my longish analysis of the article “Black Greeks” for “how white was Greece” post, I just want to say a few things here.

First of all, it looks like the article in question was not written by Winters, but by someone who has absolutely NO idea about ancient history & archaeology, and can’t tell the difference between Minoans and Mycenaeans, don’t understand who Pelasgi were, etc. I don’t think Winters would make such a mistake. Article was written by someone who is trying to present Winters’ work on black Greeks, but who doesn’t know anything about Ancient Greece. That’s why the article looks like a mess. J, you said it made sense to you, but with all due respect, you don’t know much about Ancient Greece either. Trust me, it’s a mess.

I’ll give you an example: say someone in the future decides to determine whether Americans were white. But as a proof, he takes evidence from 1000 BC till 2000 AC. And treat all those people as “American”. So he could take some Native Americans and say: these people are not white, so I must conclude Americans were not white”. Time span used in the article is not that huge (3000 years), but it is huge (several centuries). In those several centuries various groups of people lived in mainland Greece. Some of them were not Greek.

And now, this is the most important thing: Winters argue Pelasgians were not white, nor Indo-European. His idea is interesting- and possible. We don’t have much proof either way, but it’s not impossible. Maybe Pelasgians were, indeed, black. But the thing is: Pelasgians were not Greek. Nobody says they were, and nobody claims they were Indo-European.

Also, the article seems to skip Mycenaeans (first Greeks) altogether and jumps to classical Ancient Greece instead. This is incorrect. Once again, I guess that’s author’s fault and lack of knowledge and not Winters’.

Not to mention they argue whether Socrates was black, as if he was Pelasgian. Even if Pelasgians were black, they were not Greeks. Greeks came from north and were, presumably, Caucasian. They mixed with Pelasgians and, if they were black, the offspring was mixed. But Socrates came 10 centuries later. That is one thousand years later. Unless someone of his near ancestors was black, he could hardly be described as black on the account that thousand years ago black people lived in Greece. I don’t think even the most rigid one drop rule could go that far.

It is Western histiography that states that Alexander the Great ie Macedonia is tied to Greek civilization.

And to a large degree this is what the C.A Winters article is doing, in my view. It is taking the ‘accepted position’ in
Western academia and/or what he thinks it may be, and then showing why it is problematic but from an African centred perspective.

This type of analyses whether the Greeks can be classified as ‘European’ is a novel idea but it does not fit in with what has bene taking place over the last hundred years or so. And I do not think we should lose sight of that even if the argument is true.

It is Western histiography that states that Alexander the Great ie Macedonia is tied to Greek civilization.

And what would be non-western views on this?

I mean, Macedonians did adopt Greek culture (more or less). That is not an issue. They were not the same as Greeks, and the level of “adopting Greek culture” is something we could discuss.

And to a large degree this is what the C.A Winters article is doing, in my view. It is taking the ‘accepted position’ in
Western academia and/or what he thinks it may be, and then showing why it is problematic but from an African centred perspective.

The article is not saying anything about Macedonians. The focus is on early Greece, and the period several centuries before the rise of Macedonia.

Winters’ views are interesting, but this article represent them in a really bad way, because I am sure it was written by someone who knows nothing about Ancient Greece.

This type of analyses whether the Greeks can be classified as ‘European’ is a novel idea but it does not fit in with what has bene taking place over the last hundred years or so.

Of course. This view of Greece is relatively new. Still, it can’t be said (like you argued) that scholars NEVER talk about it. They do. They do today. If you want to say they didn’t discuss this in the past, this is true. But nobody argued whether Egypt was black either. Afrocentrism as a school of thought didn’t exist. A lot of things were different in social sciences a hundred years ago.

“They do today. If you want to say they didn’t discuss this in the past, this is true. But nobody argued whether Egypt was black either. Afrocentrism as a school of thought didn’t exist. A lot of things were different in social sciences a hundred years ago”.

‘Afrocentricism’ as a concept may be tied to the U.S but ‘African centred thinking’ is a lot older than ‘Afrocentricism’ by hundred of years and even back then, ie over a hundred years ‘Black scholars’ were suggesting Egypt was a Black civilisation. This very point is even alluded to in the link you provided with C.A Winters

‘Afrocentricism’ as a concept may be tied to the U.S but ‘African centred thinking’ is a lot older than ‘Afrocentricism’ by hundred of years and even back then, ie over a hundred years ‘Black scholars’ were suggesting Egypt was a Black civilisation. This very point is even alluded to in the link you provided with C.A Winters

Thanks for the clarification! Unfortunately, I didn’t get that from the article, like I said, I found it messy. Thanks for clarifying.

However, you have not identified as yet what actually
is ‘Ancient Greece’??

Oh yes, sorry. Ancient Greece is an ancient (lol) civilization that lasted for several centuries: from about 8th century till 146, when Romans made Greece into a province of their province. Some people argue Ancient Greece, in fact, existed only till late 4th century, when Macedonians came (and joined Macedonian and Greek culture is called Hellenistic).

NONE of this applies to periods Winters discuss. He talks about earlier period, several centuries before. This period is, in fact, the time Greece was formed and social structure transformed. The rise of city state (in 8th century) and Greek alphabet are usually seen as starting points of Ancient Greek civilization. However, that doesn’t mean the culture just appeared out of nowhere one day in 8th century. What happened before (in Greek prehistory) is very important. My work mainly focuses on Iron Age (that lasted from 12th till 8th century- the very period in which social structures slowly formed).

Westerners (WASPs) had (have?) this twisted image of Ancient Greeks as being noble, wise, and, well, white. White not like your average Greek (Mediterranean type), but – I don’t know- white as marble, white as WASPs, I guess.

Yes, of course. This is a topic that’s a regular among whites pondering important matters. Pretty much every day.

You wrote:

If you see their culture as cradle of your civilization, you will start imagining them as yourself (your people), because you believe only your “kind of people” are intelligent and superior.

It seems your analysis does the opposite — it explains why virtually no black nations have embraced the timeless ideals of democracy and other developments attributed to Greece.

However, based on your explanation and from the efforts of many others to redefine Greek civilization as a society that was at least partially black, you are suggesting that if only the word would spread that Greeks were black then the black world of today would get onboard with all these ideas that have been co-opted by whites.

However, I am having problems still following the sequence of logic, of teh point you are getting at,, and things like C.A Winters article does not show African centred ideas have not been around for a long time, when it did.

Anyhow, please correct me if I am wrong when I say the following is in ‘essence’ the Western position regarding Greek culture civilisation, heritage etc??

However, I am having problems still following the sequence of logic, of teh point you are getting at,, and things like C.A Winters article does not show African centred ideas have not been around for a long time, when it did.

No, you are correct, I was wrong: Winters showed African centred ideas are not new. It was my fault- I didn’t get that from the article.

Anyhow, please correct me if I am wrong when I say the following is in ‘essence’ the Western position regarding Greek culture civilisation, heritage etc??

You are correct. Though I must add ever westerner (Eurocentric) scholars questioned that view (presented in 1,2,3) and today it is concluded not everything was the way it was believed. But those opinions (1,2,3) are still very popular, especially outside academic circles (among general population). If nothing else, the whole European identity is based on #1.

Yes, of course. This is a topic that’s a regular among whites pondering important matters. Pretty much every day.

I never said that. Average Joe doesn’t really care about anything that doesn’t concern him, and Ancient Greece is not really important to anybody, is it? That doesn’t change the fact scholars from 18th century saw Ancient Greece as white civilization. That view is later populated so even kids in school learn it. It shapes the way people see Greece, even if they don’t think about it much.

It seems your analysis does the opposite — it explains why virtually no black nations have embraced the timeless ideals of democracy and other developments attributed to Greece.

What part of my analysis? Also, note that I said westerners saw Ancient Greece as white, but not the actual, modern Greeks, who were too dark to be considered white at the time.

if only the word would spread that Greeks were black then the black world of today would get onboard with all these ideas that have been co-opted by whites.

Well, you may read my replies any way you like- and if this is the way you want to see it, go for it.

I see. So the answer is embarrassing and that has led you to some version of the Arab Trader sidestep.

Elaborate.

Why have the democratic and other intellectual principles that arose in Greece been so painfully absent from subsequent black history if blacks were part of the brains behind them?

What “other intellectual principles” that arose in Greece have been “so painfully” absent from subsequent black history?

I guess you argue it’s white race what made Greeks develop democracy and “other intellectual principles”. So, if white skin is all you need to have to develop all these wonders, tell me: why most of the white cultures didn’t have democracy and “other intellectual principles”? If whites are, you know, that superior and all?

As far as the other principles attributed to Ancient Greece go, you know, the logic stuff, the basic science and math.

Then I guess you are unfamiliar with math, science, astronomy etc. that was developed before Ancient Greece, knowledge that Greece adopted. If you are not familiar with history we can’t talk. Educate yourself a bit and then come back to discuss.

The so-called “ethnic Egyptians”–as in, descendents of the originals–are still alive–much like America’s own Native Americans. These self-proclaimed “black Egyptians” look quite “black”–black skin, curly hair, you name it. They consider themselves black.

And yet not once on here–aside for the link I posted earlier–has anyone stopped to say, “Gee…why don’t we ask them what they think?” Not the Arabs who arrived in 7 AD–we already know what they think–but the people still living in Egypt in 7 AD who were colonized and effectively pushed into the background.

How come no one here is trying to track them down and get first-hand information from them?

Why has white and asian intellect developed and successfully applied itself to many of the challenges of existence while black intellect has not?

Here in the modern world knowledge is free. There is prosperity.

As a result of that prosperity, people from all over the world have worked hard to spread all the free knowledge to those who live in Africa in the hope of relieving the misery.

Why is it so hard?

Singapore went from an asian backwater to one of the wealthiest nations in the world in 40 years.

Considering the abundance of knowledge, technology and human willingness, the transition from primitive to modern should have become much easier. But in Africa the transition is barely evident, and in some ways things are going backwards, thanks to the demented work of muslims.

“You are a determined sidestepper and evader. You now define temporize and dissemble.”

Oh please, you are way worse than Mira. Mira is an honest person who is trying to understand. You are neither honest nor trying to understand. The Africa thing and the white inventor thing has been explained to you several times, but you prefer to wallow in your racist wet dreams. You are a waste of everyone’s time.

J – dare I say your afrocentrism is rubbing off on me. (Its probably safe to say that the Greeks were not homogeneous in appearance and more than likely a mixture of the Egyptians along with other surrounding influences.)

And yet not once on here–aside for the link I posted earlier–has anyone stopped to say, “Gee…why don’t we ask them what they think?” Not the Arabs who arrived in 7 AD–we already know what they think–but the people still living in Egypt in 7 AD who were colonized and effectively pushed into the background.

Thanks for the article- it is very, very interesting. Of course, one must understand that “ethnic purity” here means “ethnic as ethnic group” not “race”.

Modern Greeks strongly base their identity on two principles: Ancient Greece and Byzantine empire. They see themselves as descendants of both and are very proud of it. They strongly dislike when someone else (for example, western Europeans) try to “claim” Ancient Greece for themselves.

That’s why I find this hypocritical:

Other Europeans have become irritated with the Greek myth of ethnic purity.

But the same “other Europeans” are the ones who STOLE Greek monuments and CLAIMED their culture for themselves.

Whether Greeks were genetically identical to Ancient Greeks is irrelevant here. Whether Greeks have right to claim Ancient Greece more than other Europeans is what is relevant. I’d say that, if nothing else, monuments belong to Greece and should stand in Greece.

PS-All the people of today’s Balkans are a heavy mix. Mix of indigenous people, Romans, Celts, Slavs, Turks and anyone else who was here at the time (many people settled on Balkans and they always mixed with those who came before). That shows in Balkan populations- most of the people are mixed in this sense.

Exactly. Before the onset of colonization from the Persians, Macedonians, Romans and Arabs and any ensuing admixture, the Egyptian populace was black. Remember, the victors write history not the vanquished, just ask Hawass! De Volney wrote of the native Egyptians as being black as the current inhabitants at the time attested to. De Volney wrote in the late 1700’s, early 1800’s. In the time continuum, that wasn’t very long ago.

If I had as much free time as you appear to have – if I did not work and have children – then, you know, I could spend my days writing long anti-Semitic rants on your blog. And whenever anyone challenged me I could dismiss facts that did not suit me and apply bad logic and all the rest in order to “win” arguments. And then when people tired of debating an ignorant fool like me I could declare victory. And then continue to spam your blog with my rants.

I think it is also important to remember that colonisation came not just from the north, but from the south as well. The Ethiopian empire of Aksum and the empires of Kush and Nubia (from northern Sudan) also controlled large parts of Egypt at various times.

So I think it is too simplistic to merely regard Egypt as a black culture swamped by Caucasians; waves of both black African and Middle-Eastern conquerors would have left their imprint.

Remember that across north Africa there are also pre-Arab indigenous peoples – the Berbers – who are predominantly Caucasian in appearance (though certainly with varying degrees of black African genes as well).

Noticeably, the two Nubian gentlemen in that video, while certainly being “black”, have features that clearly display some Caucasian ancestry.

Again, it shows a complex picture of ancient Egypt and the difficulty of placing people into clearly defined categories.

And as for the race of the Egyptians what Western academia has essentially done is to suggest that the only type of ‘Black’ is the ‘Negro type’.

The Egyptian do NOT approximate to the ‘Negro type’ so therefore they cannot be’ Black’. This is one of the reason we can hear today, debates about Nubian skin tone being ‘quintessentially’ different to the Egyptians, and therefore could not be the same ‘race’ of people. Almost ignoring that there is already a diverse range of skin complexions on the African continent.

There clearly is and always has been significant strains of Sub-Saharan (Black) African genes in Egypt. The only question is what genetic mix constitutes ‘black’ and what doesn’t. The answer to that question is a based on cultural biases. In the US they had blacks and whites mixing and they decided to have a ‘one-drop rule’. So people with predominantly European ancestry and features are considered black. In Latin America they decided that light skinned individuals with some African ancestry could be considered white. In the English and French-speaking nations of the Caribbean they decided that lighter-skinned people of mixed-race belonged in a separate racial category. So if anyone wants to put ancient Egyptians in a racial category based on their modern culturally-based view of race they can do that. But it is anachronistic.

However, I could just partially open it and I got to only read about the first 5 lines.

The young girl is NOT an Aborigine (ie from Australia) but originates from the Solomon Islands in the region called ‘Melanesia’ translated in meaning to be the ‘Black islands’ from the Greek melos denoting Black, and nesos meaning island.

The second link shows a young boy againt NOT an Aborigine but from Vanuatu in Melenesia in the Pacific ocean

from reading this thread I think everyone on it has a different idea of what “black” means in an Egyptian context!

I agree that black Africans are diverse, genetically the most diverse on earth.

But genetic studies seem to show that there has been significant movement back into NE Africa of West Eurasian genes. So while there is plenty of indigenous diversity among African phenotypes (eg. the San, the Nilotes, the Pygmies, Bantu) the “Cushite” phenotype of NE Africa is pretty clearly reflective of West Eurasian (“Caucasian”) influence.

I’m not sure if this is counter to what you are saying, J.

Btw I’ve heard quite a few Ethiopians rail against any suggestion that they are part Caucasian, as if that somehow makes them not really African. Studies show though that the West Eurasian gene has been in NE Africa for possibly 30,000 years, so that makes it pretty African.

” … In the US they had blacks and whites mixing and they decided to have a ‘one-drop rule’. So people with predominantly European ancestry and features are considered black. In Latin America they decided that light skinned individuals with some African ancestry could be considered white…So if anyone wants to put ancient Egyptians in a racial category based on their modern culturally-based view of race they can do that. But it is anachronistic”

There is one bit of the jigsaw puzzle that is missing.

Irrespective of the system of slavery, what one can observe is that if Whites mated with Blacks, and/or Native/indigenous Americans during periods of slavery

Those OFFSPRINGS were NOT classified as ‘White’.

I think there has been a slight ‘conflation’ so as to reach the conclusion that it could be anachronistic to suggest the ‘race’ of the Egyptians

“from reading this thread I think everyone on it has a different idea of what “black” means in an Egyptian context!”

You have hit the nail on the head and this is what is referred to as ‘euro-centred’, and it shows the importance of being able to ‘think outside the box’

As for genes flowing Back and forth. I tend NOT to get into that because it is the ‘outward appearance’ which is important.

Since As Diop once said, on the genetic level, it is possible to get an African being closer to a Swede than say another African.

Finally regard to Asia, Blacks were the first to populate that region, so I am not quite sure what scholars mean when they refer to a ‘West Eurasian’ genes, in particular when we are referring to phenotypes (ie outward appearances)??

J – sometimes I’m not sure I follow you. You say its about “appearances” and not genetics. However, fundamentally, if we are talking about Egyptians and the various African/Meditteranean influences – then population would have been diverse enough to have more varying degrees of both stereotypical (White/Black) features. (Note: use of the term White/Black is used loosely here since both are defined differently based on individual perceptions)

My point being is that if as you say, “As for genes flowing Back and forth. I tend NOT to get into that because it is the ‘outward appearance’ which is important.”

Then many Egyptians would not have been seen as Black in your eyes due to their “appearance”, while many others would, yet genetically they all would have been predominantly the same.

You said, “Since As Diop once said, on the genetic level, it is possible to get an African being closer to a Swede than say another African.”

I’m not following the logic if you are only giving credit due to a people if they “appear” a certain way. It they “appear” differently than your concept of “Black” as appearance, are there achievements no longer measurable – no longer considered Black?

Eurocentrists tend tend to do this to “lessen” Black achievements historically throughout the history of Mankind; however, it sounds like you are doing the same thing from an Afrocentric perspective, in that if ones “appearance” isn’t Black enough, (even though the genetics are there) it doesn’t count.

OUT OF AFRICA – I mean, the real dilemma lies in the fact that we are all out of Africa and share the same SINGLE forefather… Phenotypic differences that we see today didn’t start appearing until 20,000 years ago….. If you think about it, 20k really isn’t that long ago.

@ abagond:“So you are saying there has been a Back to Africa flow of people over the long-term?”

Recent genetic studies I have read seem to confirm that while the initial migrations of modern humans were out of Africa, there was a later migration back from SW Asia into Africa. The first one was thought to be around 30,000 years ago and undoubtedly there’s been more since. It’s hardly surprising when you consider that there was so much going on in the Middle East, of course some Middle Eastern people were going to cross over into Africa.

More recent migration back into Africa was probably what introduced grain agriculture into the Nile Valley. It is also notable that the Amhara of Ethiopia speak a Semitic language close to Arabic, different from the Hamitic languages of their neighbours (Somali, Tigray, Oromo, etc). So the Amhara would appear to be the product of migrants from Arabia mixing with native Ethiopians.

“Some people say that East Africans look more Caucasian, but I thought it was the other way round: it is Caucasians who look more East African because that is where they are from.”

The Caucasian phenotype would not have developed in Africa, since it is in large part a response to environmental conditions that don’t exist there.

The early people who left Africa (and thus gave rise to all non-African peoples) would not have looked Caucasian; although they equally would not have looked exactly like modern Africans either.

If ten pharaohs got on a bus in Birmingham, Alabama in 1950, how many would have to sit in the back?

If none of them is a Hellenistic (Ptolemaic) rulers, all of them. Of course, if we take as a fact that Greek/Macedonian person would be considered white.

Or better yet: the paper bag test

Same here. Or not. Would Greeks pass paper bag test?

One note here, thought: the term “pharaoh” doesn’t equal “ruler of Egypt”. Only later rulers of Egypt (especially in the New Kingdom) were called pharaohs. Before them, there was more than thousand of years history of Egyptian rulers who weren’t called that way.

Mira – I had made some earlier posts on the same thing. Many Meditteraneans/Southern Europeans from today would not have passed the paper bag test. Now imagine the ones with coarser/curlier hair!!!

In fact, if you play this “time/slip” scenario, many “Whites” today would not have been considered White in the earlier days of the segrated U.S South. (which is sadly all too much a part of recent history.)

There is still this ‘ethnocentric’ tendency to formulate this debate according to U.S standards

I think if you used the ‘Arab model’ for race, then the Egyptians could ultimately be any shade of skin under the sun.

There is also another aspect to this topic in that talk of a Black Egypt and/or Egypt being an African civilisation is only a recent phenomena, in Western academia, and in fact slowly represents a recent paradigm shift/or theory change.

For much of the study of Egyptology in Western academia has outrightly rejected any Black/African influences of Egypt from 1800s (with a few dissenting voices here and there).

“It is also notable that the Amhara of Ethiopia speak a Semitic language close to Arabic, different from the Hamitic languages of their neighbours (Somali, Tigray, Oromo, etc). So the Amhara would appear to be the product of migrants from Arabia mixing with native Ethiopians”.

There are a number of issues here which are been conflated from the ‘perspective’ you are utilising vis-a-vis an African centred perspective.

There had been interaction between ‘Arabia’ and ‘Ethiopia’ for many thousands of years, considering that the two regions are only separated by a relatively small stretch of water.

However, there are some scholars who suggest if you go back in antiquity, you will see Arabia (or parts of it at least) as merely as an extension of Ethiopian territory.

This is why it is suggested that the Queen of Sheba either originated in Ethiopia and/or Saba (ie Arabia)

As for Hamitic languages this term is no longer prevalent, but I do understand the suggestion, which is also part of the conflation in my humble opinion.

With regard to ‘Semitic’ languages. It is also suggested by some scholars like C. Ehret amongst others that the Semetic language in fact originated in Africa and spread to places like the ‘Middle East’.

“The Caucasian appearance of some Ethiopians is in a large part due to their Eurasian (here read NOT Black/African) ancestry”.

I would take that to mean that Ethiopians have both black African AND Eurasian ancestry. No serious anthropologist would say that they are not black African, but it’s also pretty obvious from genetic studies, and just by looking at Ethiopian faces, that some of their distant ancestors were of a SW Asian phenotype.

Regarding the Arabian/Ethiopian connection:

Let’s just take it as given that populations on the Arabian peninsula have been more Caucasian in appearance and those on the African side of the Red Sea have been more black.

Regarding Semitic languages originating in Africa:

The Afro-Asiatic family almost certainly does come from NE Africa originally. But the Semitic branch of it seems to have migrated out to the Middle East, which would make Amharic a back migration into Africa.

With regard to Ethiopians having Eurasian features. I think Mathilda’s blog is very clear about this point that she views Blacks as being of a certain type.

This type of thinking reveals itself again in her blog about the Andamese although she refers to them as ‘Negritos’. she says

“They look very out of place in the Indian ocean, physically they look a lot like pygmies, with jet black black skin, peppercorn hair and ocassionally steatopygous buttocks on the women. BUT AS FAR AS DNA GOES THEY ARE DEFINITELY ASIAN”

And just one other thing when we speak of the movement of language it in fact tells us nothing about the ‘race’ of people using that language.

With regard to Afro-Asiatic or Semitic language. It is believed by some that the Sabean (Arabia) script used in Aksum (Ethiopia) is derived from there.

However, this is NOT the same as saying ‘Semitic language’ has its origin in the’Middle east’.

The problem is that this information does not tell us whether it was derived from the Ethiopians that resided there, other Blacks, ‘Semitic people’ (if I am allowed to use and get away with this), or even Caucasoid in the region?

Nor does it take into account whether the ‘Semitic language’ was taken from parts of N.E. Africa to the Middle East and then subsequently re-introduced back into places like Aksum (Ethiopia) etc

This issue is highlighted in the quote below

“…It is also not known whether the adoption of the language was due to an early pre-historic migration of peoples from across the Red Sea or due to acculturation as a result of Arabian conquest of the pre-Aksumite state or some other close association. In time the language became less like South Arabian and evolved through an intermediate language called Ge’ez into the modern languages of Amharic, Tigre and Tigrinya (Connah, 1987)”.

@ J:
what she says about Andaman Negritos is technically correct. In phenotype they look more like Africans than anything else. But DNA-wise, they are more closely related to Asians.

Your point about the movement of language is very true and shows how it is tricky to talk about language as an indicator of population movement.

One complicating factor about reading and interpreting Mathilda’s blog, or indeed any of the comments here including yours and mine, is that we are trying to come to conclusions not just about what the writer thinks, but also dealing with the way they are trying to explain it to the reader. I mean, in this conversation between you and I, we have thrashed out the meaning of “black” even though I suspect we were sort of on the same page all along. So bear in mind Mathilda is also trying to write for an audience and put it in terms they will understand. If a writer has to constantly qualify what “black” or “African” means, it becomes a clumsy read, so the writer will often assume their reader has a certain understanding of it, rightly or wrongly.

Some people say that East Africans look more Caucasian, but I thought it was the other way round: it is Caucasians who look more East African because that is where they are from.

I mean, isn’t that how it went?”

As far as I understand it, no. Bear in mind that the East Africans who left Africa gave rise to ALL non-Africans. And it was a LONG time ago – we are talking anywhere up to 120,000 years ago by some estimates. And it is unclear how many such major migrations we are talking about.

At that point, these people wouldn’t have looked Caucasian at all. If anything, they looked most like modern Africans, yet different – Africans that stayed in Africa continued to evolve and change in appearance.

The people who left Africa first settled the coastal fringe of Asia and then Australia, then gradually moved inland.

The phenotype we call Caucasian (or West Eurasian) would not have evolved until much later, possibly 30,000 years ago, in Europe or Western Asia. This would have been due to various selection factors, including the environment – dry and cold ice age environments would favor lighter skin, thinner lips and smaller nostrils, in contrast to the tropical people in Africa and Asia.

I’m not sure why there seems to be an assumption by some on this thread that prehistoric migration was only in one direction – out of Africa. Clearly the initial movement of people was, but once non-African people started to get a foothold in SW Asia, it is only logical that they would spread out into the most accessible parts of the African continent – along the northern coast and down the fertile Nile Valley. This would have happened a number of times, including when the development of agriculture in the Levant caused a population surge and demand for new territories to farm.

The drying up of the Sahara appears to have been an obstacle to population movements north and south. This would allow Caucasian genes to spread east-west with some ease, but not penetrate further south except in the areas along the Nile Valley. Likewise, black African gene flow to the northern coast was also limited by the expanding desert.

Thus Egypt and Ethiopia were prime locations for mixed populations to occur.

Just to say that nothing could be further from the truth about the Andamese being ‘African’ by ‘race’ and Asian (with epicanthic fold) by DNA.

This is the classic ‘euro centred’ rhetoric used by anthropologists in the past but re-jigged in a modern way.

And I do not know if you are aware of the African centred position and theory of how Blacks populated the globe (including Asia)? Where the White/Caucasoid originated from?? Why it was necessary for them to originate?? The origins of the Mongoloid race and so forth.

However, I would humbly suggest that you read those and then compare and contrast thae evidence that you have before you with waht you have learned from a euro-centred perspective.

got a link to that African-centred perspective that you can recommend? (Save me a bit of time sifting through the net, which will have plenty of dubious stuff no doubt)

I have no doubt that the people who left Africa and populated Asia were black. But if the Andamanese and say, Chinese, were descended from the same migration, that makes them more closely related to each other than to Africans.

Since modern humans are most ancient in Africa, the greatest diversity in genetics occurs there. As I understand it, all non-Africans are more closely related to each other than to Africans, because they descend from one genetic type that left Africa.

But also I’m aware that Afrocentric takes on scientific thought can run the gamut from reasonable to totally out-there whacko sort of stuff. So I’d prefer not to waste my time sifting through the latter, to get to the good stuff.

Here are some links. I am sure you are aware that its not merely a case of reading the links and ‘accepting’ or ‘rejecting’ them as the case may be. Its a case of undertaking a further and much longer journey of research for yourself.

The reason why genetics is NOT important is because as Diop said on the molecular level an African can be closer to someone in Europe, say Sweden which is a thousand miles away, than another ‘African’ who is on the same continent, a few hundred miles away.

The problem with who are the Egyptian is that it is tied into the assumption that there is strictly only one type of Black person in the world, there are NO variants in the race ie ‘The Negro type’??

This ‘true Black/Negro’ is the only type that exist in the real world. So any time Western academia came across groups of ‘humans’ who looked ‘Black’, either in Africa or outside the continent. They could easily argue these are NOT Blacks, even if they may ‘appear’ so – is because the only yardstick is the ‘true Black Negro’, and nothing else

Thanks for notifying me that you had not yet managed to read any of the links yet. Honestly, I had NOT even seen that part about the Black Shogun, and I had to go through the respective links.

It appears inadvertently, or otherwise that in an attempt to utilise the ‘fallacy of ridicule’. You have revealed inadvertently your sub-conscious/unconscious processes and more importantly that your ‘mind is closed’.

This being the current situation then we both can stop the pursuit of our discussion on the evolution of races and what constitutes them, rather than some other topic which was never even part of the debate.

Herneith is distorting ancient historical writings..SMH Just like all Afrocentrics..SMH

Here is truth:

Herodotus is actually very specific about the Ethiopians (black Africans) getting control of the Nile at Elephantine, and differentiates between them and Egyptians.

“After this man the priest enumerate to me from a papyrus the names of other Kings, three hundred and thirty in number; and in all these generations of men eighteen were Ethiopians, one was a woman and the rest were men and of Egyptian race.”-Herodotus

Other Ancient Greek and Roman quotes.

The Ethiopians stain the world and depict a race of men steeped in darkness; less sun-burnt are the natives of India; the land of Egypt, flooded by the Nile, darkens bodies more mildly owing to the inundation of its fields: it is a country nearer to us and its moderate climate imparts a medium tone.

Manilius, Astronomica 4.724

The appearance of the inhabitants is also not very different in India and Ethiopia: the southern Indians are rather more like Ethiopians as they are black to look on, and their hair is black; only they are not so snub-nosed or woolly-haired as the Ethiopians; the northern Indians are most like the Egyptians physically.

Arrian, Indica 6.9

As for the people of India, those in the south are like the Aethiopians in color, although they are like the rest in respect to countenance and hair (for on account of the humidity of the air their hair does not curl), whereas those in the north are like the Egyptians.

Strabo, Geography 15.1.13

Black people resided not in the Nile valley but in a far land, by the fountain of the sun.

Xenpohanes (Hesoid, works and says, 527-8)

… the men of Egypt are mostly brown and black with a skinny desiccated look.

Ammianus Marcellinus

A little explanation required for this one, the term ‘brown’ means tanned. About 1/3 modern upper Egyptians would certainly have been called black by the Romans.

subfusucli {“somewhat dark/swarthy”)

Ammianus Marcellinus 22.16.23- from Black Athena revisited

And finally, of lower Nubians:

It was a market place to which the Ethiopians bring all the products of their country; and the Egyptians in their turn take them all away and bring to the same spot their own wares of equal value, so bartering what they have got for what they have not. Now the inhabitants of the marches (Nubian/Egyptians border) are not yet fully black but are half-breeds in matter of color, for they are partly not so black as the Ethiopians, yet partly more so than the Egyptians.

my comment wasn’t meant as disrespect, I’m grateful for those links. But I was also pointing out that in that particular link I mentioned, there is a lot that seems bogus. I can’t say that for the ones I haven’t read. But that particular one is very hard to take seriously.

I am open-minded, but a necessary part of being open-minded is having the bullshit meter turned on as well – there’s such a thing as being too open-minded.

You’re obviously a troll who doesn’t know much, if anything, about ancient history and archaeology. Still, I’ll reply to your posts, no matter how ridiculous they sound.

Ancient Egyptians were not black, although Nubians ruled for less than a hundred years before they were pushed back down south.

Are you aware of the fact that Nubia and Egypt shared the border that changed throughout history? There’s no way one of them could be snow white and other black, when they’re neighbourhood countries.

“After this man the priest enumerate to me from a papyrus the names of other Kings, three hundred and thirty in number; and in all these generations of men eighteen were Ethiopians, one was a woman and the rest were men and of Egyptian race.”-Herodotus

Sure. But where does this say “Egyptians were white” and “Ethiopians were black”?

Same goes for other quotes. Noting physical differences is not the same as making division between races!!!

However, it still does NOT explain how we moved from the origin of humans, colour of their skin, emergence of other races, and how Egypt/N.E Africans came to be classified as Whites-Hamites/Caucasoid, and the issue of a Black Shogun?? Inadvertently or otherwise this is a ‘red herring’ introduced in the debate. Or at the very least a reflection of some other thought processes on your part.

Since it is strange you never read the links but the one you did mange to have a brief look at at, did not even cover our topic matter – but rather the Black Shogun

I did NOT take it as a disrespect to be honest. I just wished I did not tke the time to find the appropriate link, highlighting the necessary pages in some instances and a precis is what the link is about.

If you see my original post. I am NOT trying to convince you of anything. My only position is that you are using and accepting ‘euro centred’ and sometimes ‘racist’ assumptions. However, you seem to be unaware of this possibility, whilst at the same time critiquing ‘Afrocentrics’ not on the merits of its theory, but by thome same euro-centred perspectives that you hold .

So this is why I said:

However, I would humbly suggest that you read those and then compare and contrast the evidence that you have before you with what you have learned from a euro-centred perspective.

and to pre-empt your last post, I went on to say

“Here are some links. I am sure you are aware that its not merely a case of reading the links and ‘accepting’ or ‘rejecting’ them as the case may be. Its a case of undertaking a further and much longer journey of research for yourself”.

So I still stand by my position that perhaps its best if you do NOT read them. Since its not necessary to come back here to ‘prove’ and/or ‘disprove’ the theories correct.

Afterall this is a chatboard, where the emphasis is more on rather ‘reinforcing’ existing ideas than it being a place of self-development and ‘growth’…

first i will start off by saying that it is wrong to falsify history and document it dishonestly,well this was certainly done by europian ‘whites’ .there is wide evidents that the egyptian in ancient times were black african so this really pisses me off when movies and TV shows display egyptians as ‘white’ . and another thing national geographic explorer should be ashamed of themselves portraying the same lie and stealing what is solely belonging to africans such as gold,statues and tombs of ancient egypt. i believe that this lie whould be revailed to all but until then i would do my part as being an african decendent to tell everyone of my people the turth about our rich history of beauty and power which was then is certainly now. power to the blacks.

what about the clothing. the Indians choice of clothing suits their look.Although some one white or black may try their choice of clothing it never suits them.its the same thing with the Chinese and the Africans. the colours the Africans use in their clothing brings out their skin colour and enhances it. looking at the colours ancient Egyptians used i think they were dark skinned. when white people wear the colours it doesn’t enhance their skin but the gold, brown and other earth tone colours on a black persons skin brings out the colour nicely. Try looking at a pic of the two races side by side in the same Egyptian colours and clothing and see which they suit best. also one should not compare ancient Egyptian people to the modern ones now as there are a lot of interracial marriages and movement around the world. the same way cultures around the world specifically choose clothing that enhances their skin tone and individual looks i think the Egyptians chose clothing and colours most flattering to their skin.as for why blacks aren’t as dominant as they were then is because of slavery we must also remember that Africa itself was naturally rich as well as the Caribbean, until the whites came fought and took away its riches and wealth for themselves and took some of the surviving as slaves.the slave girls were often raped producing the mixture of skin tones we see today. just as they are a variety of white skin so is it with the black as well.
another reason why i believe they were dark skinned was how well they survived. black skin can stay in the sun very long without complications such as sunburn or skin cancer the same cannot be said about the white race and this had a lot to do with where they lived.

Quite honestly, I don’t think the acient egyptians gave this too much of tought. As a person who has been in Egypt and who has seen those small statues depicting both black and brown skinned soldiers in pharaos armies, I really don’t think they cared about such nonsense as race.

I think what they saw as egyptian was egyptian, and what was not under their control, was not. The nubians, the desert people and whom ever. Habiru’s were once egyptians, even in stone texts and not only in bible (habiru, hebrews). Who ever took the pharao as his/hers king and ruler, was egyptian. Much like (in principle at least) anyone who takes the oath and passes, becomes american citizen.

Here, once again, I see the american obsession on race at work. I might be wrong here but for me this looks just the same. Instead of talking abput egyptians, which they were after all, people ask; yeah, but what race??? Who cares? They were egyptians. And I think they both “black” and “white” and between.

And classyshosanna, I know that all the human beings came originally from Africa.

I am familiar with his work. I just wanted to read more about those “Table of nations” interpretations. Still doesn’t make sense to me, since it contradicts with everything we know about Ancient Egypt and all the other sources.

3. on Wed 30 Dec 2009 at 22:08:31 Mira

Ok, I have NO idea why previous comment was posted under “jefflion”. In any case, this is me.

So as I said it was because it as an ‘afrocentric’ perspective why you disagreed with it.

In essence you are very similar to Thad who is always doing his best to fight down ‘African centred’ scholarship.

And if one takes a precursory glance at the rest of your earlier comments. i think it is hard to refute that contention.

And this is why I suggested on another thread the information is valid, but because of your ‘eurocentricism’ you cannot accept it, and hence why I produce facts that do not support my contention.

Once again it would have been better, if you just came out and said so. However, there is the problem that ‘eurocentricism’ is the ‘only way’, and hence you could not say so – even if you wanted to.

Thank you J for posting the manuampim website. This site show the fakeness and malnipulation by whites & Arabs. How they falsified the tombs and everything so they can try to EARASE the black faces of the ORIGINAL Egyptian. Egyptian came from the south. Which means they came from SUDAN & ETHIOPIA. Not GREECE. They are the ones who brought so much creativity, education, writing, art, math, and so much more to Egypt. As a matter of fact, Greece/Rome got its civilization from Egypt. The Greeks and Romans came to Egypt as students. Then, turned on the Egyptian and used ALL of what they learned FROM the Egyptian against them. This is ( I believe) how Rome left their mark on Egypt.

2. And without you having the full evidence before you. You could surmise

2. on Tue 29 Dec 2009 at 17:43:43 Mira
@dimples

I can’t open photos on that site.

I know you’re going to hate me for this, but: Egyptians would never never show themselves identical to another, foreign people.

So, if the black figure on the left (A) is an Egyptian, so is the other black figure (C). If C is Nubian, so is A. Same skin tone, same hairstyle, same clothes. Those are the same people.

3. on Wed 30 Dec 2009 at 22:58:54 J

Hi there!!

With regard to (your comments):

“So, if the black figure on the left (A) is an Egyptian, so is the other black figure (C). If C is Nubian, so is A. Same skin tone, same hairstyle, same clothes. Those are the same people”.

Sometimes, well in fact most of the time, it can be very hard to change one’s way of thinking, if you are predisposed to think in a certain way.

Perhaps you did not mean this – and maybe you may want to correct me here.

I had always thought the representation of the table of nations is agreed upon by scholars that it represents
4 ‘races’.

If this is accepted, then the Egyptians cannot represent themselves twice and it still be a table of nation, of 4 races.

What I meant is that all we know about Egypt suggests that they didn’t see other people (Nubians, Libyans and Asiatic people) as one of their own. They were not Egyptians. End. Of. Story.

This is why I wrote: Egyptians would never never show themselves identical to another, foreign people.

Whether they were of similar or even “identical” physical appearance is irrelevant. It is important for us, today, but it was not important to them. They didn’t have races we have today in their culture. And everything we know about them suggest that they didn’t see Nubians as one of their own.

WHY would they, after all?

That’s why this interpretation of table of nations doesn’t make sense to me- why would they represent their enemies as one of their own?

In any case, you didn’t answer what makes this new interpretation (correct or not) Afrocentric.

Or perhaps it’s the “African-centered scholarship” of that white Hungarian nimrod you’ve recently cited, y’know, the guy who belongs to the very afro-centric, almost completely white Revolutionary Communist Party?

Or are we talking about the “African-centered scholarship” of the white supremacists over at Metapedia, who you’ve repeatedly linked us to as “authorities” on biological race?

I ask because you’ll note that I’ve never once trashed an “afro-centric” author whom you’ve listed (but I suspect never read) who wasn’t one of those clowns. I DO have some beefs with Diop, but they’re nothing to do with his valorization of Africa. Rather, they take umbrage with some of his obsolete views regarding the birth of civilization (views which most people of his generation had, white or black).

The point which I am demonstrating that you are against many of the links I post because they are ‘African centred’ and nothing else.

As for it being Afrocentric or not, I am afraid this is a rhetorical question. You have answered it already, when you said:

on Wed 30 Dec 2009 at 22:04:37 jefflion

“I am familiar with his work. I just wanted to read more about those “Table of nations” interpretations. Still doesn’t make sense to me, since it contradicts with everything we know about Ancient Egypt and all the other sources…[Here read from White eurocentred sources]”.

The point which I am demonstrating that you are against many of the links I post because they are ‘African centred’ and nothing else.

And that is exactly why I asked you to show me what makes them African centered. Because you say so? Because you like them? There doesn’t seem to be a clear criteria here, since you sometimes post white supremacist links and call them Afrocentric.

I asked you 2 times and you refused to answer a simple question: What makes this specific interpretation of table of nations Afrocentric?

As for it being Afrocentric or not, I am afraid this is a rhetorical question.

It’s not rhetorical, it does require an answer. You can’t claim I hate Afrocentrism if you can’t prove a specific idea or a link I disagree with is Afrocentric. And no, “because J likes it” doesn’t automatically make it Afrocentric.

[Here read from White eurocentred sources]“.

No, actually I was referring to Ancient Egyptian sources.

And if these are white and eurocentred to you, J, it’s your problem, not mine.

No!!! because the scholar who produced the work refers to himself as an ‘African centred scholar’ within that ‘tradition’

So, if I refer to myself as an African centered scholar, I can write whatever I want and you’ll be ok with it?

Also, there are some people you link who definitely don’t call themselves Afrocentric. People who are, in fact, white supremacists, but you still like their ideas. Why you like to “side with the enemy” is beyond me.

Either way you are against African centred scholarship – and that was the point I wished to demonstrate from the other thread.

I am not against African centred scholarship. And you still have to prove it. You have to show me how not agreeing with you makes me against Afrocentrism. Just like you have to prove how following Ancient Egyptian sources is Eurocentric.

@JForgive me here, I am not sure I can comment that much because I am not too sure you are conversant with Diop.

Interesting. I’m not sure that you are conversant with Diop yourself, J. You talk a sweet line of bullsh##, but when it comes to any discussion of the contents of the man’s theories, you hop away like a little froggie.

“And that is exactly why I asked you to show me what makes them African centered. Because you say so? Because you like them? ”

No!!! because the scholar who produced the work refers to himself as an ‘African centred scholar’ within that ‘tradition’

So Michael Bradley, a white guy who’s an avowed anti-semite and Aryanist, is an “afrocentric”, as is a washed-up Hungarian communist who’s working within a strictly Marxist and incredibly Eurocentric (not to mention Social Darwinist) view of Africa? And Metapedia is an afrocentric view on race is it?

Because at various times, J, you’ve pointed out all of these authors and sources as “afrocentric” and, gee, I don’t recall either Bradley nor Metapedia referring to themselves as “afrocentric”.

But hell, if that’s all it takes to be an afrocentric scholar – self-referal – I’ll start referring to both Mira and myself as afro-centric scholars from now on.

Whatever your definition of “afro-centric”, we’re certainly more in that line than the Aryan supremacist Bradley or the ex-president of the RCP.

:D:D:D:D

Oh, and J? Just because you haven’t any higher formal education to speak of doesn’t mean that everyone who’s actually cracked a textbook or two is a “eurocentrist”. Your ignorance is no excuse to trash other peoples’ hard work.

You mean on “how to tell if a commenter is white” point 1 and 2? You said my views (expressed in previous posts, I guess) show that. But I am not sure how purple people and Arab trade have anything to do with what we discussed here – or elsewhere – these days. And I’m afraid you don’t know either.

Be that as it may, however, when you suggest that I am taking random theories, which accord to my worldview, and then call them African centred is bordering on the absurd.

I don’t think you take random theories, in a way you quote people whose book covers you like or something. I do, however, believe you are not educated enough in social sciences to understand terminology, methodology, etc. That is not a crime and that doesn’t mean you are not allowed to participate in discussions. However, if understanding archaeology (anthropology, history) is so easy, then why is specific formal education required for somebody to be an archaeologist?

Also, I honestly don’t know what is your world view. You say you’re pro-Africa in one comment but then you talk favorably about Stormfront in another.

Be that as it may, however, when you suggest that I am taking random theories, which accord to my worldview, and then call them African centred is bordering on the absurd.

Certainly less absurd than your claim that Aryan supremacist and anti-semite Michale Bradley is an afrocentric scholar.

J, there is only ONE reason why you made this claim re: Bradley: you dug his “iceman” theory and were too ignorant to realize that it’s an attack on JEWS. Bradley never claims to be an afrocentrist. His theory is not in the least afrocentric.

The ONLY thing that made Bradley afrocentric in your mind is that you like him and you know nothing about the history of racism. Anyone with half a functioning brain who was a sincere anti-racist, J, would start noticing things when Bradley started connecting judaism to this supposed super-evil Iceman race.

I don’t think you take random theories, in a way you quote people whose book covers you like or something. I do, however, believe you are not educated enough in social sciences to understand terminology, methodology, etc.

…which is an absurd suggestion for a commentator, who has supposedly come here in ‘wolf as sheep clothing’, as a friend to POC

Well, I was being sarcastic, yes, but only because that was the only logical explanation. And you still failed to explain how you choose your readings, what authors you trust, what ideas, what methodology you value. And you definitely didn’t mentioned books, articles and authors you DIDN’T like and authors you disagree with. Which makes me believe you didn’t read much at all. Please correct me if I’m wrong.

…which is an absurd suggestion for a commentator, who has supposedly come here in ‘wolf as sheep clothing’, as a friend to POC

“…There doesn’t seem to be a clear criteria here, since you sometimes post white supremacist links and call them Afrocentric”.

But it’s true, isn’t it? Remember a discussion a few weeks ago (I can’t remember where) when I asked you to confirm or deny Thad’s accusations of recommending white supremacist authors. You confirmed you did, in fact, liked said author. A few days ago you spoke favorably about Stormfront. So what’s the problem then? Why are you suddenly ashamed of it?

Good try. I explained to you I was referring to bradley’s book. and simply because it is not possible to find to find Diops two cradle theory on the net, and this is the closest you can do so on the net.

I also explained to you I did not even know Bradley had a site, nor have I been on it.

This you all conveniently forget to portray me like your mentor likes to as a ‘fascist’.

Earlier you lied and suggested I used the words ‘black traitor’ and now once again you are lying

As I said I am surprised no-one on this board has exposed you, for what you are.

The White Woman Tears had conveniently protected you until you had decided to use the UM scenario to your own ends, but it has self-imploded.

As I said you are a ‘racist’ no different from the others that visit this board

Whilst here, would you like to explain what concerns do you have with African centred scholars. Since this seems rather evident in your thinking.

I believe I explained my views on Afrocentrism not once, but several times. Most of the times you commented, so I am surprised you don’t remember.

But here it is. The only concern I have is that Afrocentrism sometimes turns out to be Eurocentrism. Many of the authors were raised and/or educated in the west or in western schools. Not the best start for Afrocentrism. Also, they were all born in our world, which is, no matter where you live, eurocentric and you can’t escape that.

So eurocentric way of thinking can show in their work, which is not something, I assume, Afrocentrism should do.

In short: I don’t have problem with Afrocentrism being radical; I have a problem it’s not radical enough.

Good try. I explained to you I was referring to bradley’s book. and simply because it is not possible to find to find Diops two cradle theory on the net, and this is the closest you can do so on the net.

But that Bradley’s crap is beyond words, and it’s not even Afrocentric, it’s quite opposite of it. Just my opinion, of course.

I also explained to you I did not even know Bradley had a site, nor have I been on it.

A poor excuse for a site with a personal ad before “scientific” text, you mean? (But ok, I believe you didn’t know about it).

This you all conveniently forget to portray me like your mentor likes to as a ‘fascist’.

I never said you were a fascist (though talking favorably about Stormfront is definitely not something I like).

Earlier you lied and suggested I used the words ‘black traitor’ and now once again you are lying

You did use term “race traitor” several times here (not in this thread) and I was unaware you’re ashamed of it.

As I said I am surprised no-one on this board has exposed you, for what you are.

Luckily, we have you here to expose me.

The White Woman Tears had conveniently protected you until you had decided to use the UM scenario to your own ends, but it has self-imploded.

What white woman tears? I never behaved in such a way (cried and asked for a male protection). No white (or black) knights in shining armour came to my rescue. WTF are you talking about?

And what is UM scenario?

PS-If you were the one giving me a pass because I’m a white woman then you should really, really re-think about what you’re doing.

As I said you are a ‘racist’ no different from the others that visit this board

Since as POC knows Eurocentricism is just another byword for racism’, which implies this is what Afrocentricism is also another variant of racism.

No, no. It’s not what I meant. I didn’t mean “afrocentrism is like eurocentrism” in a way that it’s a racist way of thinking that favores blacks the same way eurocentrism favores whites. I wrote what I meant: Afrocentrism sometimes uses Eurocentric ideas, in their pure form- which means it doesn’t go against whites (like you suggest), but against blacks, like Eurocentrism often does.

But J, that is seriously, honestly, not what I meant. The above explanation I gave you several times and you always decide to ignore it. Your right, but you are not allowed to twist my words.

So bottom line from my previous comment: These aspects make Afrocentrism racist towards black people.

As for your psychoanalysis, I can see I am either hitting a nerve or you have a lot of time on your hands.

J, you live in a privileged place and you definitely don’t know what is like to live where I live, or to grow up where I grew up. At the end of the day, my people did nothing wrong to your people; but your people did ugly things to my people. So before you start to analyze somebody try to think a bit first (thinking of your own privilege is never a bad thing). And I won’t even dignify part about sexual attraction with an answer.

I always enjoy your contributions to these discussions, but with your sudden need to attack Mira, I think you need to pull your head in.

I don’t know what’s in Mira’s head, but based on her comments on many posts, she is generally fair-minded. And as far as I know she is the only one on here who has qualification in Archaeology. Which doesn’t mean she must be right, but I think her opinions are worthy of respect when talking about a subject such as this.

As far as I can see, Mira’s views on all of Abagond’s posts are much along the same lines as most of the black commenters, including you. Then, as soon as she disagrees with you on this one issue, she is a “wolf in sheep’s clothing”, only pretending to be a friend to POC?

Take this as constructive feedback from a friend: that’s some bullsh!t on your part.

If someone disagrees with you, they disagree with you. That’s not racism. And if someone analyses the evidence and concludes that they don’t agree 100% with the “Afrocentric approach”, that’s not racism either. But I’m afraid to say that you are conflating all these things here.

I have to agree with Eurasian. Of my regular white commenters Mira is by far the most fair-minded. It is rather strange you would go after her of all people.

It is perfectly fine to disagree with what someone says or show why it is racist. But with Natasha and Mira you have gone beyond that into making personal remarks. That is completely uncalled for and is, besides, an ad hominem attack. It does not matter whether what you say about them is true, it is still an ad hominem.

Maybe Natasha and Mira are affected by white racism in their views. Fine. But show that from the statement of their views, NOT from what you know of their personal life.

I think it was you who said that RR claims to be black to protect himself from ad hominems so he can get a fair hearing for his views. Well, everyone regardless of race or the race of their boyfriend should get that hearing and not have their personal life brought in to discredit them. That is just plain low.

I don’t think egyptians thoughed themselves as anything else. After I visited Egypt some years agi and studied the acient monuments etc. I came to conclusion that Egypt was not that much about race or color definition. You can see it clearly just by lookin at any portrait of human they made.

Now, to claim that egyptians were white is about as funny as to say that the earth was created roughly 4000 yrs ago. It is pure nonsense. The old egyptians were mixed folks. They were partly punic immigrants (from the land of Punt somewhere in the East of Nile in the land of Rising Sun. Beyond the Red Sea??), native peoples who lived in the Nile valley before them, and the much more black people from the Upper Nile, present day Sudan.

When you look at their miniature models of soldiers, foot soldiers that is, you see all kinds of colors mixed in neat troops. There are totally black units from Nubia too, but in the “regular” pharaonic armies there were guys from black to light brown side by side. If you look at their drawings and paintings it is absolutely clear. There are all kinds of colors, from the lightest brown to black.

So to claim they were white as in Europe, that is pure nonsense. They were not. But at the same time one has to remember how the egyptians saw themselves. They made a clear distinction between themselves and tribes on Upper Nile or to the west in Nubia. Egyptians did not see themselves as part of the “black african” sphere. On the contrary, the draw a very clear line between the southern tribes and themselves. So the afrocentric simplistic view is also nonsense. Likie abagond writes in the “motives”, afrocentristic view is based on political motivation, not in history.

So what is my take on this? Egyptians were of mixed “race”. Only the pharaonic families were “pure” because they married sisters and brothers etc. Other than that I belive “egyptian” was an identity. It did not matter that much what was your skin color if you were seen as egyptian or recongnized as such. Hence the multiple colors on the people in their drawings and pictures.

I think the whole race issue came much more later, at the dawn of the egyptology. Eurocentric scientists wanted to see egyptians as somekind of white. And in the last century afrocentric movement wanted to see them as black. And the one drop idea gave them the bragging rights and long faces for whites. But that is mainly an american debate. I don’t think too many historians nor scientists even think about this. For it is more than clear to anybody with pair of somehow operational eyes, that the acient egyptians were not snow white dandies.

I agree. Given Egypt’s geographical location, and how the fertile Nile Valley would provide a likely conduit for the movement of peoples northward and southward, it is logical to imagine that Egypt was populated by a mix of numerous groups from both Africa and SW Asia.

I sense you have a ‘thing’ for merely defending and protecting the ladies on this blog.

Obviously you do not want to be losing contributors

Why do I say this??

If anyone should feel ‘moral outrage’ it should be Thad.

And if you were being consistent. You would have mentioned this earlier.

What was said of Natasha and Mira in my opinion is the ‘truth’ – and as we know that is very ‘painful’.

This why ‘individuals’ cannot grow.

Back to my point.

I have continuously made reference to Thad’s partner.

The reason why I have done that is because I have always wondered, if Thad is like that away from the pc screen, then that Black woman has to be strong to endure such thinking. Or in my opinion lacking race consciousness’.

If anything, you should have come here and said do not mentionhis partner, because

1. She is not here to defend hereself
2. She has not spoken to you directly.

However, in this instance because of your ‘animosity’ toward Thad. You have problems extending such ‘grace’ towards him.

And what do you mean when you suggest:

“It does not matter whether what you say about them is true, it is still an ad hominem”

This is bordering on the absurd.

I can remember when you were hypothetically explaining a situation and you referred to Thad’s partner as a 4 legged creature

Also, please note I never said I wasn’t affected by white racism in my views. I never claimed to be completely free of any racism.

As for:

What we have here nonetheless is a White person trying to suggest that I have ‘fascist’ tendencies, following her mentor.

J,

I never said you were a fascist. I said you recommended works by white supremacists. There’s a difference. To be honest, I think you didn’t understand his work and you mistaken it for Afrocentrism or something. (And yes, I might be wrong and we can discuss why you think it’s not the case).

The key point about Bradley was he a White Supremacist when he wrote his book critiquing the White race, some 33 years ago??

It is not a key point about him. But it is confusing to me that you’d claim to be Afrocentric AND recommend somebody like him, and then come back and call people who disagree white supremacist. You can recommend any author or a book and it doesn’t have to be Afrocentric, of course- but I was very confused. It’s like a Jew recommending “Mein Kampf”- not something I’d expect.

White Supremacists argue that the White race is the ‘best’ and special in God’s creation and all other races are inferior.

This is a lousy definition of a white supremacist. You said yourself one doesn’t need to believe any of this and be white supremacist.

Bradley -who himself is White – argues that White people and their racism is the anomaly on the planet, and this is what makes them ‘special’ in a very bad way.

No. Bradley- from what I’ve seen- basically argues that people who had Neanderthals as their ancestors are more aggressive and prone to violence.

And people who, in his opinion, have Neanderthal genes are not whites but Jews. (And yes, I know Jews are considered white, but Bradley never accused other whites, you know, those who were really colonists… Just Jewish genes).

So the way I interpret Bradley (and I might be wrong and we can discuss) is: Jews did it. We (white people) are not guilty of anything, those were evil Jew genes in us, so you n…. that complain should direct your anger at Jews and leave us alone. It’s not our fault!

I am not going to give you all the information which I know you have been searching hard for:

Diop on Two Cradle Theory and origins of racism/white supremacy

Q: What is your opinion of Cress Theory of Color Confrontation??

Diop: “There is absolutely no doubt that the white race…was the product of depigmentation….c. 30,000BC…

However, there can be no doubt that the ‘cultural outlook’ of these ‘proto-whites’ was eventually conditioned during the glacial epoch…

Molded by their environmental cradle these early whites developed a social consciousness of xenophobia (ie fear of strangers) and patriarchal organization.

I think what Dr Welsing has accurately assessed is that at the origins of racism we are to find a definite defensive reflex….

By counterdistinction, we have no evidence that blacks in ancient times and right down to the medieval epoch developed any such behavioural attitudes in their relationship to other races…

I feel this needs to be studied carefully. What I find remarkable is that in the individual attitude of Blacks towards other races there’s a different approach. Blacks are not ‘racist’.Blacks are not afraid of ethnic contacts.
Whites are…

What is quite evident…is that xenophobia is definitely an entrenched trait of European cultures from way back. I think most European scholars would agree with me on this…”

Michael Bradley delves back into our glacial past during the last Ice Age in order to find the prehistoric sources of the white race’s aggression, racism and sexism.

Relying on the researches of Alexander Marshack, Carleton Coon, Konrad Lorenz, S.L. Washburn, Ralph Solecki and others, Bradley offers a persuasive argument that the white race, the Neanderthal-Caucasoids, are more aggressive than others because of ancient sexual maladaptation.

And, in tracing the effects of Caucasian aggression, Bradley offers an uncomfortable and all-too-plausible explanation for the pattern of human history

The Diop quote had nothing to do with what Bradley wrote. It’s maybe about the same topic, but it’s not the same.

In short, Diop says: “whites developed xenophobia and blacks didn’t”. Bradley says: “Neanderthal genes in Jews were violent and made all the mess!”

He’s basically letting western whites off the hook with this, and blame it everything on Jews and people of Eastern Europe and Caucus- people who, let me refresh your memory, never colonized Africans and were often victims themselves. On the other hand, he argues that western Europeans don’t have this “evil” DNA.

I can Google and I can read reviews. I don’t need you for that. I need you to give me additional info on the book (since you read it, right?), something I can’t find by Googling, so we can discuss. I am sure you’d be more than happy to do that, since we all know that info provided on the book covers and in reviews is not enough. And since I can’t afford to buy this book, I am sure you’d be more than happy to explain what Bradley really said with the book, about his methodology and interpretations. I’m all ears.

Also, I did read the title: it says WESTERN man’s aggression, not WHITE man’s aggression.

“Forgive me ES, your ‘even-handedness’ has a place but it also fails to adminster ‘justice’ when a debate is clearly unfair and there is an undertone beyond the mere words on a computer screen.”

You want me to administer justice? I’ll call it as I see it; I told Thad he was out of line when he was enthusiastically targeting you recently on the Negritos post, and when he was getting nasty towards leigh204. And now I’ll tell you that you are well out of line on this one.

The “undertone” seems to me to be entirely of your own imagining.

Feel free to argue with Mira and anyone else about the issues. But it is your attempts to psychoanalyse commenters which is well out of order.

Mira disagrees with you because she has come to a different view. There is no evidence anywhere to say that this is because she is racist/white-supremacist/whatever you want to label her.

Likewise Thad: he has a tendency to come across like an abrasive, arrogant prick and indulge in ad hominem. But is he a racist? Not based on anything I’ve read here.

I hate to break it to you, but the set of ideas you adhere to regarding Egypt and Diop have NOT been conclusively shown to be true. They are certainly worth considering, but they are up for debate just like anything else. You seem to believe that one cannot respect black people without believing in your set of Afrocentrist ideas. And thus you are seeing racists everywhere.

“You seem to believe that one cannot respect black people without believing in your set of Afrocentrist ideas. And thus you are seeing racists everywhere”

This is your caveat, but the truth of the matter is the commentators do not know enough about African centred ideas or theories to even begin a resonable discussion.

Nor do you.

What is actually happening??

With the discussions here people like you are arguing from a euro centred perspective with no knowledge of the African centred perspective.

I am arguing from an African centred perspective with a knowledge of the euro-centred perspective.

When I conclude by suggesting the validity of certain African centred perspectives over the Euro-centred one.

You reach for the aforesaid caveat about my ‘set of Afrocentric ideas’.

However, you do not tell the audience that you intend to ‘remain in your ‘set of euro-centred ideas’.

The best example is our discussion on why N.E. Africans have ‘Caucasian’ features?

In your ‘perverse thinking’, because you can’t see outside of your own ‘eurocentricism’, you probably think it is an error as well as an African centred perspective to suggest that Blacks had ‘Caucasian features’ and Whites inherited it from them.

Rather you accept the ‘euro-centred’ perspective, but you do not call it that, nor do you see it that way. The only plausible way that NE Africans can have ‘Caucasian’ feature is because of inter-mixture with Eurasians type.

This is the contradiction which you cannot see within yourself, but falsely can project on me.

So as much as I am stuck in ‘African centred’ ideas it has to be said that you must be ‘brainwashed’ by ‘euro-centred thinking’.

Why do I say this?

I say so, as I said earlier I have a knowledge of both systems. You have only the one to go by, and if this is the case. Then one is limited .

A euro-centred perspective is not going to get humanity to discuss the possible origins of racism, from Diop’s perspective, which proves my point about having an overall understanding with regard to systems, ideas etc.

However, I remember from a past conversation that you have already made your position clear what you think of African centred thinking – and it is not complimentary either.

It will be interesting to see if you can think outside your own ‘eurocentred thinking box’ and understand the essence of this post.

J sez:What we have here nonetheless is a White person trying to suggest that I have ‘fascist’ tendencies, following her mentor.

Given that Mira has called me as many names as you have, J, I hardly think I qualify as her “mentor”.

Let’s put things very simply here: you are butt-hurt because a man you thought “afro-centric” (whose works you’ve probably never read) has been revealed to be an EXTREME racist.

This is not me making crap up, J: this is something that can be easily confirmed by anyone who chooses to take a gander at Michael Bradley’s website.

Mira is not “copying” me any more than she would be “copying” me were I to say “water sure is wet” and she, upon conducting an independent investigation herself, were to say “Yeah, water is wet”.

Bradley’s a racist and this should be obvious to everyone. Hell, the man begins his book by saying “This is a racist book”!

You trumpeted Bradley’s nutso theories as great afrocentric stuff, J. When confronted with what the man actually WROTE, instead of saying “Whoops, sorry, my bad”, you’ve slapped down one race card after another.

What’s worse is that both Mira and I have asked you, point blank, “do you REALLY believe this crap?” and you haven’t even bothered to try to distance yourself from it. In other words, as far as I can see, J, you do indeed believe the racist garbage Bradley puts out and you really do think it’s afrocentric.

THIS is what underlies my calling you a fascist and racist: your repeated insistance that clearly fascist and racist thinkers are, in fact, afrocentric and great scholars.

This ain’t an ad hominem J: it’s a straight up, clear-cut analysis of your views, as presented on this forum.

Now, as far as I can see it, you think that Mira and I are racist because we are a) melanin deficient and b) have the audacity to disagree with your whacked out theories.

Period.

As for the theory of ideas to explain Western white racism from this perspective, it is hard to find Bradley’s thoughts and even harder to find Diop’s expressions on the matter.

That’s because you’ve never read either man. Diop would have been APPALLED at Bradley’s loonie re-boot of Aryanism.

J, if you actually READ the man’s book and other publications, it’s quite clear that he sees the “icemen” as seperate from “whites”. He believes that there’re a raftload of white people who have been invaded and degraded by the “icemen”.

And just to let you know this is why I did not type ALL of what Diop had to say, because I knew yould ignore it.

J, I think we can dispense with the fiction that you’ve actually read Diop. Your “all that Diop said” is probably some out-of-context comment you’ve culled from a wierdo website – rather like that “proof” of yours that “Afrika” was a more African way of spelling because (according to your highly knowledgeable internet source) no European languages other than German have a “hard c” sound.

In other words, J, your proofs always seem to wind down to quoting someone who quotes someone else – generally far out of the original context.

And I’ll repeat, by the way, that you’ve given us exactly NO evidence of some deep connection between Bradley and Diop other than Diop’s assertion (backed up by pretty much every human geneticist in the world, btw) that whiteness is probably a genetic divergence which happened 30,000 years ago, give or take some milenia.

I have news for you, J: believing that a color change occurred in a given set of human peoples 30k years ago is NOT the same thing as believing that said group of peoples represent some über-evil race with a collective biology and culture which has come down through the past 30 millenia essentially unchanged.

You’re like the kind of creationist fool who sees an article talking about the mDNA Eve and uses that as “scientific proof” that the Biblical story of the Garden of Eden is true.

Let me break it to you, J: “Whiteness” is caused by the expression of one mutation of one gene, commonly carried by many animals. You’re trying to say that that one gene causes an entire range of complex behaviors which are expressed, unchanged, across cultures and across time.

That is nuts.

All Diop does is express his belief that said skin color evolved out of a darker human norm. HE DOES NOT SAY, EVER, that this somehow creates a specific people witha specific culture.

However, the funny thing is you know a little about Bradley, just recently, and you know next to nothing about Diop.

J, I READ Bradley shortly after you pointed him out BECAUSE you pointed him out and because his book didn’t seem to be anything like what you claimed it was. It’s available as a torrent on the internet, you know.

I realize that the idea that someone can read a book in an afternoon might be unbelievable to a man who rarely reads more than one webpage at a time.

As for Diop, I’ve read some of his stuff, yes, and I’ve claimed this from the beginning. I used to believe that you had read more, so it was natural to ask you where you were getting this information that Diop believed in the Iceman theory from.

It has since become more than obvious that Diop says nothing of the sort. If he did, you’d hardly restrain yourself from rubbing the proper quote in my face. The so-called connection between Diop and Bradley is something you’ve concocted on your own, apparently without reading either man. Diop worked all his life against racism, criticizing the exact sort of gutter-philosophies that Bradley repeats. You’re saying the man believes the same thing as Bradley is simply ridiculous. You’re like that nutter who claims that Hitler and all the SS were secretly gay. 😀

And this is what upsets you. The very premise which you have been fighting on this board for the longest time, that Whites are not exceptionally racist than others is the very thing Bradley attempts to prove for ALL White people (including European Jews).

What is strange in your fallacious reasoning is your attempt to reveal to us that Bradley is a ‘White Supremacist’, even though he shows that the ‘White race’ is unique with regard to racism. Something a valid ‘White Supremacist’ would never consider doing.

Nor does he say anything about ‘Black people’

Good try, my friend, but your reasoning skills have let you down once again.

“J, if you actually READ the man’s book and other publications, it’s quite clear that he sees the “icemen” as seperate from “whites”. He believes that there’re a raftload of white people who have been invaded and degraded by the “icemen”.

Can you tell me where he says this, and the page number too? Remember I have the book at home, so I can check the usual nonsense that you continually spew.

And this is what upsets you. The very premise which you have been fighting on this board for the longest time, that Whites are not exceptionally racist than others is the very thing Bradley attempts to prove for ALL White people (including European Jews).

What upsets me is stupidity, J, especially when it’s couched as revolutionary analysis.

First of all, it’s damned obvious – or should be – that “whites” are not now and never have been a homogenous group. I do not think the Slavs and Irish are as responsible for racism and injustice in this world as, say, the French. So the whole idea that “white” somehow can cover the historical activities of the ancestors of what are now close to a billion very diverse people is, to me, simple stupidity. Is this a racist reaction because I feel defensive? Hell no! I’ve made the same comment repreatedly about “blacks”. These overarching racist terms do not describe cohesive political and cultural units and never will.

Secondly, the only people the idea that one’s biology somehow determines one’s politics and that each “race” of humanity thus has a “natural” political position is fascism, pure and simple. I’m willing to talk about white racism all day long but I am not a fascist: I do not believe that individuals are “naturally” anything simply because they are part of a greater collectivity.

Thirdly, the idea that a certain level of melanin in one’s skin “naturally” determines one’s views and behaviors is biological determinism at its finest. It is unscientific and cannot be proven in any way, shape, or form.

So get this through your head, J: I couldn’t give a fat flying f*** how the so-called “white race” is portrayed: it’s the very concept that there are biological human races which are neatly divided into political and cultural units that offends me. It offends me because it is STUPID and, moreover, a form of stupidity which has killed and continues to kill millions on this planet.

I could care less whether you think blacks or white are naturally superior, J: it’s the notion that humanity is broken up into “natural” political and cultural units based on biological race which I find stupid and ridiculous.

With regards to Bradley, sorry, you’re wrong. If you read what the man writes, it’s very clear that he has a PARTICULAR “white man” in mind: one which is semetic.

rather like that “proof” of yours that “Afrika” was a more African way of spelling because (according to your highly knowledgeable internet source) no European languages other than German have a “hard c” sound.

“J, if you actually READ the man’s book and other publications, it’s quite clear that he sees the “icemen” as seperate from “whites”. He believes that there’re a raftload of white people who have been invaded and degraded by the “icemen”.

Can you tell me where he says this, and the page number too? Remember I have the book at home, so I can check the usual nonsense that you continually spew.

“Caucasoids” – by which he means white people – are distinguished from “Caucasoid-Neanderthals” or “westerners” – by which he means the Jews – at several points in the book. A good example of this can be seen in footnote #9 where in spite of Indian’s “caucasoid” biological heritage, their cultural heritage cupposedly keeps them from degenerating into “icemen”.

This thesis is also further explored and made explicit in Bradley’s later booksm most specifically “Chosen People from the Caucasus”.

And what link did you get this from, or is it in the book, if so can I have the page number so i can ensure you are NOT utilising ‘intellectual dishonesty’ once again

Cheers!

“Caucasoids” – by which he means white people – are distinguished from “Caucasoid-Neanderthals” or “westerners” – by which he means the Jews – at several points in the book. A good example of this can be seen in footnote #9 where in spite of Indian’s “caucasoid” biological heritage, their cultural heritage cupposedly keeps them from degenerating into “icemen”.

This thesis is also further explored and made explicit in Bradley’s later booksm most specifically “Chosen People from the Caucasus”

A critical analysis of this text will show that you are having a very difficult time finding information about Bradley.

However, like the Diop qTwo Cradle Theory & Racism, I wish you all the best in your research endeavours

You want others to provide proof of everything. Yet you are alleging racism on Mira’s part based on what proof? If you want to claim she is a wolf-in-sheeps-clothing who only pretends to be friendly to POC because she is sexually attracted to black men, prove it or don’t say it. What you are able to read between the lines doesn’t count.

You reach for the aforesaid caveat about my ‘set of Afrocentric ideas’.

However, you do not tell the audience that you intend to ‘remain in your ‘set of euro-centred ideas’.

As I have said earlier on this post or another one, I am not closed off to the ideas of Diop and others on this. However, the vast bulk of research on these matters does come from, as you put it, a Eurocentric perspective. So like it or not, that is the knowledge base that most people are grounded in.

Afrocentric ideas are still, at this point, a radical departure from established knowledge. This does not mean they are not true, but at this point they are still considered radical. Thus you need to accept that most people are yet to be convinced about them.

But you seem to think that the ideas are obvious and established as truth, and thus anyone who doesn’t agree with them must have something wrong with them, or some racist agenda.

Rather you accept the ‘euro-centred’ perspective, but you do not call it that, nor do you see it that way. The only plausible way that NE Africans can have ‘Caucasian’ feature is because of inter-mixture with Eurasians type.

It’s not the only plausible way. It’s just what I think is the most plausible way. I weighed up the evidence that I know of and came to an opinion that is different to yours. You consider that “brainwashed”?

Maybe I am. But at the same time, we are intelligent people on here and we are still quite capable of forming opinions (correct or not) on our own without being brainwashed.

I said
Thad… has a tendency to come across like an abrasive, arrogant prick and indulge in ad hominem. But is he a racist? Not based on anything I’ve read here.

You said
LOL. Well at least that’s out of the way.

Don’t get me wrong, Thad. I actually think you seem like a pretty cool guy. But arguing with people on this site seems to bring out an ugly side of you. I’d love to have you as a lecturer, as long as I didn’t disagree with you.

Just to say you seem to have found your ‘even-handedness’ once again but I have to say to very diassapointing effect:

Its clear you picked out carefully what to respond too and left large significant parts unaddressed, almost like a skilful politician dodging key questions:

Here goes:

1. I asked you if you read the other thread. It is clear you did not. And this as I said this was very foolish and arrogant of you – and I stand by this

2. You do not seem to understand why I levelled the charge of racism? I was falsely accused of something which was not true, and even when this was pointed out. There was still a refusal to concede the point by the commentator.

Again you would not know nothing of this cos’ you did not bother to have the facts before you. Without stating the obvious there is 2 sides to every story.

3. I see you avoid the very issue of your euro-centredness and how it in facts hampers how you look at the world, along with your lack of knowledge about African centred theory. Again this matter is on the other thread with regard to the commentator. However, you chose to ignore.

4. As for African centred ideas they are not ‘radical departures’. The thing with ‘knowledge’ (epistemology) is that it is not based upon a consensus. If White people say it is true and propogate that truth around the world then it must be so.

5. With regard to these comments below:

‘If you believe this to be the case: ‘But you seem to think that the ideas are obvious and established as truth, and thus anyone who doesn’t agree with them must have something wrong with them, or some racist agenda’.

I could level the same charge at you when defending your own eurocentred ideas (leaving aside the racism part of the above), mutatis mutandis.

The thing here as I said sincerely in my previous message to you. You and the other commentators do not have enough knowledge. So with regard to The Table of Nations. The commentator could not give an explanation why the idea was wrong – apart from it contradicted all that had been learnt previously in a euro-centred environment. I hope you understand what I am referring to, and this was not another bit you managed to skip over?

6. As for your comment: ‘I weighed up the evidence that I know of and came to an opinion that is different to yours. You consider that “brainwashed”?

I would say yes, just as you see me stuck in ‘my set of afrocentric ideas’ mutatis mutandis

Therfore what I would say to you is:

1.’reason over emotion’,
2. read all the facts before jumping in,
3. Understand both sides of the argument (ie commentators)

And finally ‘even-handness’ has its uses but the way things unfold, it usually involves a compromise of ‘truth’ for one of the parties.

On a board like this the ‘words’ is what should constitute the ‘facts’, not one’s sentimentality etc.

I find it a bit odd that you are making this argument. Most commenters in your position think that I am way too nice to Thad.

Thad plays rough so he gets less protection from me. As far as I can remember he has never complained to me about it. To his credit he understands that if you dish it out then you got to be able to take it.

Even as it is, I did kick off B.R. after he completely lost it and let loose on Thad.

And once again, ad hominem is not the same thing as slander. Everything you say can be true and it can still be an ad hominem – because it makes no difference WHO puts forward an argument. The Devil himself could do it. It does not matter: arguments stand or fall on their own merits.

“Its clear you picked out carefully what to respond too and left large significant parts unaddressed, almost like a skilful politician dodging key questions:”

There is only so much time in the world, J, and I have other things to do. So forgive me if I don’t fit every question in.

“1. I asked you if you read the other thread. It is clear you did not. And this as I said this was very foolish and arrogant of you – and I stand by this

2. You do not seem to understand why I levelled the charge of racism? I was falsely accused of something which was not true, and even when this was pointed out. There was still a refusal to concede the point by the commentator.

Again you would not know nothing of this cos’ you did not bother to have the facts before you. Without stating the obvious there is 2 sides to every story.”

1. Which particular thread are you talking about? I believe I have read most of them, and did not notice any evidence of Mira’s heinous racism at work. If there is something in particular that I may have missed, kindly point it out.

2. So if someone falsely accuses you of something, that is racism? Poor judgement, a mistake, a misinterpretation, perhaps, but racism?

I assume this is in reference to the term “race traitor”. I did not see you use this term but I certainly felt you implied as much in reference to Natasha.

There are indeed 2 sides to every story. And this is the whole point. You are quick to judge and psychoanalyse without fully understanding where that person is coming from. Mira may seem racist from your point of view (and Natasha may lack “race-consciousness” from your point of view), but that is YOUR side of the story. It is interesting that none of the other numerous POCs here seem to have come to that realisation regarding Mira.

At the end of the day, none of us can know all that much about someone based on their comments here (apart from the Alan B’stards and no_slappz’s of this world, who make it pretty obvious).

Btw, I think Thad’s attacks on you are considerably worse than yours on Mira. However, you seem more than happy to dish it back and go toe-to-toe; I stick up for Mira more because she seems to want to fight fair (based on arguments, not ad hominem), and also because I haven’t seen her write anything that deserves your ire in such a way.

Regarding my thoughts re: Egypt and the rest:

Perhaps they are Eurocentric. The bulk of the research on archaeology, genetics, anthropology and so on has been done by people coming from the Western tradition. So like it or not, thinking on Egypt is heavily informed by this, rightly or wrongly.

Discussing this with you has made me consider some things and not take certain things for granted. But much of it has yet to fully convince me.

The thing that rankles here is that if you see someone that disagrees with you as being “brainwashed”, you are basically saying they do not have the brains to make a decision based on logic and reason. Myself, Thad and Mira are all pretty intelligent people, yet our capacity to form our own opinions is not respected – it is as if we are merely passive receptors for white propaganda, in contrast to the enlightened J. Or not only that, that there is an agenda to defeat down Afrocentrism because it threatens the supposed white racist POV of Thad/Mira.

J, I honestly think this Iceman-Neanderthal-Caucasian theory is not one of the strongest in the world. First of all, we have no proof what so ever of the color of the neaderthals nor the homo sapienses in those times. It is assumed that neaderthals were white and sapiens black or POC. But nobody knows. It is just a guess at this time. Nobody really knows.

I would be and I am very vary for any attempts to reconstruct the history of human “race” based on race because those attempts were and are still in the core of racism. Race theories of the nazis were based on the idea of separate races and their relative values. Of course so called aryans were on top of the pile. Nazis believed that aryans were blue eyed blonds when in reality the closest to so called aryan (iranian) were the gypsies in Europe. And nazis murdered hundreds of thousands of gypsies in camps. So when somebody starts to talk about race as a way of constructing a system of values and societies or such, I come very alert.

This being said, I have no problem in recognizing the racist history of Europe or whites anywhere. I have no problem admitting the horrendous actions that whites have done to people who have different looks or color. Slavery, colonialism in Africa and around the world, genocides in Africa and specially in Americas etc. These are all historical facts and if one wants to be any wiser, one has to accept these facts.

All of these terrible things have been done on the bases of belief in different races of humans. It is the belief that the other guy is not really a human, that gives to an ordinary housewife the ability to watch a lynching with a smile on her face in 1930’s South. She believes that blacks and whites are not the same race. So lynching a black man is no different to her than killing any other living thing that is not her race.

If one recognizes that were are all humans, one cannot act like this. If you accept that we are all one race, human race, regardless of our color, looks, culture etc., any violence towards any of us feels wrong, as it is supposed to feel. Any mistreatment, unfairness, is wrong. And any kind of racism is simply wrong.

Ok, enough of that hippie shit! Then to debate Eurocentric vs. afrocentric. Afrocentric movement has shaken a lot of concepts which has been good. But to try to move perspective ( even if understandably) from the opposite side to the opposite side regardless of anything, is political action. Not history. And sometimes one goes little bit on overdrive with it.

Eurocentric views in history have been dominant for so long that people do not understand that they are also politically motivated in many instances. In recent times, however, and partly because afrocentric movement, the way people look at history has changed a lot to more open and critical perspective to it. Thanks partly for the afrocentric views of history some of the old constructions and explanations have been removed and thinking has been rejuvenated in the field of history. This has been good.

Don’t get me wrong, Thad. I actually think you seem like a pretty cool guy. But arguing with people on this site seems to bring out an ugly side of you. I’d love to have you as a lecturer, as long as I didn’t disagree with you.

I have no trouble at all with people disagreeing with me, as long as their arguments havesome rationality behind them. When the argument is “Things are this way because I say they are and you are a [ad hominem] because you believe differently”, then I really don’t think they deserve much respect.

As for the J being a fascist thing, I’m not saying this for kicks, I’m saying it because that is what his political philosophy really, truly looks like from over here: blood = politics. And I think it’s obscene that a self-proclaimed anti-racist should be flogging that particular dead horse.

But hey, I’m willing to quit at least until the next time J cites some aryanist nut as an afrocentric resource. Though given J’s track record so far, my bet is that’ll be within two weeks or less.

Egypt wasnt the sole example of dark brown population with “thicker” phenotypes than the perspective of their european or asian neibghors.In Cyrinaica,2800 years ago the first to inhabit/settle the area were Greek dorian bands from theres and southern lakonia.The found nobody there,but soon enough the started communications with the neigbhouring tribes of interial Cyrenaica as well as with the tribal kings of coastal Tripolitis.They mingled with those semitic-hamitic tribes.Many kings of Libya took greek grils for their wives,and Greeks civilized the whole area of modern northern libya.The point is how the population of northern libya,viewed the barbarians of the south.During late hellenistic and roman times,they have the same notions for the southerners similar to those the egyptians of the middle kingdom had for the southerns(Nubians,bantus,ex).Violent immigrations and constant invasions from the south,similar to those in eastern europe(huns,goths,turks,slavs) may have contributed to that image.Provided descriptions and surviving texts speak for ebony uncivilized hars people from the south.Despite the average souther european and roman viewed nothern libyan populations as darker for centuries,and had this notion well in their minds.The same populations were well awared of their racial position,and distinguished themeselves from the south(south and central modern libya and the whole sahara region generally speaking).Since the first cbeing managed to survived upon this planet various tribes have been emerged in the light of day,vanished from it,transfromed at the pass of time or mutated for various reasons.Sometimes we make various speculations about the appearance of speciment,like dinosaurs,in a certain area.Sometimes we try to hard to prove that the inhabittants of that sole area are its exact survivors/descendants.Why its is not impossible for that specimen not to survived or survived in limited insignificant numbers or parts of the present population?Shuffle blue with red,and you have purple.Shuffle yellow,orange,dark green nad pink and you may have the same result,purple.The same colour just in different times.Claiming that ancient egyptians were bantu-like despite the scientific proofs,just for the boast after so many decades is as stupid as the ones who claim that ancient egyptians are racially the same with swedish,french or english.Ofcourse never forget the stupidity of modern egyptians who have tons of arab blood in their veins,especially from fathers side(lol),just to entertain their nationalism.

Herodotus was a Greek philosopher at east let us say he could see!!! I don’t care who built America or what not. I’m African and I care who will rebuild my continent with me. My friends in Nigeria are Egyptians and they don’t look anything like Arabs. When we went to Egypt for his dad’s birthday, what I saw surprised me. The people in this part of Egypt are nothing but blacks they are not as dark as Sudanese thought they look Ethiopian. Africans are diverse and that doesn’t include the Arab invaders. Africans are generally diverse in every sense!!!!

You might have already posted a link up thread, but where is the proof/study that

“Present-day Egyptians are, by blood, about 60% Eurasian, like the Arabs who took over their country, and 40% black African.”

I had thought about this before while looking at coverage of the Egyptian uprising. So many of them LOOKED like they were mixed race. You probably wont even see this comment being that I am so late, but I would really appreciate seeing where you got your information from.

Well, something funny, Friday I bought a book about an X-ray investigation into Royal Mummies, from the 70’s, to support some project supporting streetchildren in Bolivia. According to that book, though not using such vulgar, concepts as “black”, the skulls suggested that the Pharaohs of the 17th dynasty were indeed Nubian blooded, at least some of them much more than later dynasties. Tutanchamon belonged to the 18th dynasty, just to give you an impression.

Can’t believe I didn’t mention this earlier, but there is a strong similarity between Egyptian dialect and that of the Yoruba of Nigeria. Both languages sharing many words that while having the same meaning, are either pronounced the same or are pronounced slightly different.

Man kind has done a lot research,into the african history,but still want to disagree,can’t we easily see that we all are the same people,same Race we just look different,All of our ancestor’s are mixed,all are African.We keep trying to be something else,even neanderthal,originated in africa,It’s the Devil himself that invented the races in the minds of his follower’s.

Consider this, the Afro-Asiatic language family has roots in what is now Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa, this includes but is not limited to Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, Ancient Egyptian, and Phoenician. It would make sense that the speakers of these languages in ancient times were partly or entirely black African, and that the founders of the civilizations that spoke them were the descendants of migrants from the green Sahara, who brought their language and culture with them, and as some anthropologists would attest, grain agriculture and animal husbandry.

Yes pretty much. Most have agreed that Northern Kmt (Where King Menses [sp?] the joiner of north/south Kmt) was purely Black while southern Kmt was mixed. Much of Eqypt may speak Arabic now but the 20% Arab population controls the government. Indigenous people of Ancient Kmt are still around however.

From what Ive read and heard, Africa is the most diverse place in the world. People like Horn Africans, who were once thought to have ‘Euroasian’ DNA by Eurocentrics, are actually 100% African. Why is it then, that some people feel its ok to call modern day Egyptians invaders? If Africa is so natrually diverse, is it not possible that the people in the north (by the Mediterranian) look a bit different from those in the south.
Its thought that the Islamic conquests didnt really make a dent on the Egyptian population genetically therefore calling modern day Egyptians ‘Arab invaders’ doesnt make much sense.
This debate also seems to only exist between black and white people (Afrocentric and Eurocentric). Rarely do we hear from actual Egyptians and rarely do people seem to take their self-esteem and self-determination into account.

The sad thing is people are still confused about this. The only guy who could possibly answer all those in doubt questions is Cheik Anta Diop and he is deceased.

He extracted DNA from mummified bodies to prove his point. They were according to modern day standards black Africans. Like Carruthers and Clarke says, it stood for 10,000 years before Europeans and others begin to penetrate into that area and only then do you get the mixing and lightening of the population.

It only makes sense.

You can debate Cleopatra all day long; however she came during a later dynasty that by then had been heavily mixed, but WE do know that Tiye, Hatshepsut, Tut, Ankhenaten, Ramses, Nefertiti and Neferatari were black men and women. They found freaking afro combs in these folks tombs.

@phoebeprunelle – good points. what im talking about is different though. im saying that people seem to assume that the lighter egyptians are the result of admixture depsite the fact some anthropologists (like s.o.y keita) i beleive have mentioned africa being natrually diverse and therefore not needing outside elements to create differences in features.
while theres no doubt that over the many years, mixing has happened, we should also bare in mind that some of that diversity seems to of occured natrually.
if there are people who might happen to be mixed nowadays, should it not be down to them how they identify? i dont see why they should be any less egyptian and take any less pride in their heritege than those that are considered ‘pure’ and i dont see why people living thousands of miles away (although i know not by choice) should decide and choose who gets to claim the heritege.
most the mixed race people i know take more pride and identify more with being black and are allowed and encouraged to do so. it is only when it comes to modern day egyptians that i see (mainly african americans) denying them this and claiming their just ‘arab invaders’.
academia should take afrocentrism as a serious perspective and acknowledge egypt as being an african civilisation and afrocentrics should accept that modern egyptians have the right to have a say on their identity and heritege to.

I think the “arab invader” verbal accusations are towards those with government control and are apart of the arab minority in Kmt. Some ppl who have visited that country mentioned much of kmt being blocked off and how it is being identified as a West Asian country (which it is not). It doesn’t make the term right or fair I just feel that if a person observes a country being passed off as “Middle Eastern” by its government when it is not then read flags will be raised. Not sure if that makes any sense. It has less to do with the native population I think, but I could be wrong.

@Deedee – Good points. From my understanding, the government might have pan-Arab political ideologies but that doesnt mean they literally hail from the Arabian penisular. Most times when I’ve read people using the term ‘Arab invader’ they havent specified who they mean so it comes across as if they are just saying it about all the members of the population who arent black.
I cant really comment on if it should be classified as Middle Eastern or African as Im not an Egyptian which is kind of my point…..it should ultimatley be down to them how they are referred to.
Identity is a personal thing. Its not right that people who arent from the place, even if they have some biological link to it, should decide if it is part of the Middle East or Africa and if the people are Middle Eastern or African.

I can believe some of the population were Arabized (speak Arabic and are Muslim) but Im not sure the likelyhood that the Muslim Arabs actually wiped out the native popluation and replaced them.

I recall reading about an 80s biopic which starred Black American actor Louis Gosset Jr. as Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. According to the article the film was banned in Egypt due to a Black man being cast as their president. I also recall reading somewhere that some Egyptian spokesperson or other stated that, though they don’t nurse black and white racial notions in the way that Americans do, most Egyptians would categorize themselves as “white” (or words to that effect).

I’ve heard that before to. Would be interested to know if it was actually banned soley for the reason of them not being keen on a black man playing Sadat or if they were just being their iron fisted selves and not allowing for anything even remotely critical of their regime be shown. Either way thats not good of them.

I can honestly say that it makes more sense to use geography to determine a country’s location. Egypt is predominately in Africa with a little peace on an Asian peninsula (which has the smallest of the population residing there). I believe it is fair to associate that country with Africa on a geographical standpoint. However, if we are to use culture and how the society views itself then it is also fine for the country to identify with countries outside of the continent as long as that does not confuse people of the actual location of the country (there are people who do not know that Eqypt is located in Africa..D:).

Some of the links mentions how modern Egyptians view themselves and it is a mixed bag. Some personally view themselves as Egyptian and not Arab (generally those that do not speak Arabic or are non-Muslim). Others embrace their current Muslim identity and embrace being Arab although genetically they are not (apparently according to DNA studies). Even though the full title of Modern Eqypt is “Arab Republic of Eqypt” it has been shortened allegedly due to the the growing number of citizens not wanting to be viewed as Arab.

“I can believe some of the population were Arabized (speak Arabic and are Muslim) but Im not sure the likelyhood that the Muslim Arabs actually wiped out the native popluation and replaced them.
”

Actually almost all of the population were Arabized (over 90%). That does not mean that those people are genetically Arab. it just mean that the current predominate culture is Arabic in nature. From some, especially those that are anti-Arab, that can be viewed as an invasion and by sociological means that is similar to invasion-succession except that the “race” of the citizens never changed, just the culture.

On a last note, it can be tricky taking the word of the current citizens on how they identify because it can be complex depending on the history. For some the lasting effects of colonization can skew their view of themselves and cause them to take on the cultural identity of their colonizers. Others might resist and hang on to their native culture. It’s really difficult to know but I can definitely understand listening to the words of the citizens rather than people who analyze the citizens. It makes more sense.

@DeeDee – Thanks for the links, Ill read through them more fully when I have time. I skimmed the Guardian one.

Im already aware that Egyptians prefer to be referred to as Egyptian and not Arab. Its similar in countries like Iraq and Lebanon to, especially in the Christian communities.

With that being said, the point I was trying to make was that it is down to them how they identify, not you or I. Some people seem to struggle to accept modern Egyptians referring to themselves as Egyptians because they associate Egypt and Africa with blackness so feel todays inhabitants are ‘invaders’.
I agree that an invasion can be a socio-political/religious issue, not a genetic one and that has obviously takin place in much of north Africa and the Middle East (Lebanon, Palestine-Israel, Iraq…).

Its a no brainer as to where its located geographically…..Africa so its therefore African. In the British Muesum, its in the African section to.

As a last note and just to be clear, I said several times that it is down to them how they identify…..’them’ meaning the regular citizens.

I think you miss understood me. I do not care and have not tried to identify the people of that country. It is basically like Ancient Kmt. “Black” Eqyptions up top (North Kmt) and “mixed” Eqyptians at bottom (South Kmt).

What I have done is mentioned how the physical country, not the population, is passed off as a Middle Eastern country, which it is not. The political status of the country is not determined by the citizens but by politics. So while the country itself may have “Middle Eastern” values it is not itself an actual “Middle Eastern” country based solely on geography. Politically, an entirely different story…

As a last note, the regular citizens weren’t given a choice in how they wanted to identify. They were force fed Islam and Arabic culture and learned to embrace it. Now they are taking back their identity as Egyptian. If someone wants to view the “less Black” South Egyptians then so what? That is there opinion and it does not matter to the people living in that country. They are familiar with their own history and culture, so why do the outsiders looking in opinion matter so much to you? The outsiders cannot and will not shape how the world looks at those people. So just move on if you can, any non-Egyptian opinion..really doesn’t matter as far as it concerns Egyptian people. IMHO. (Also because it isn’t clear, I am not upset and don’t view this last paragraph as an attack although it may seem like that. I understand where you are coming from because it happens in any country where the indigenous culture is replaced by another culture. Self-identification is tricky but not something to be concerned with unless you are the affected party, IMO).

This is debateable. Due to colonialism, most Africans on the continent of Africa practice watered down versions of their former selves. The indigenous/traditional culture has largely been replaced by Christian and Islamic value systems.

Don’t worry, I know, I honestly wished I edited that post before submitting it. At my former University a young woman from Africa remarked how middle schoolers knew who her home country’s current leader was when she didn’t.Then there is the lost of language as well at times. But TY for your input anyhow. I welcome any corrections or suggestions.

Smh at the young woman you mentioned. My time in Ethiopia was marked by frustration and just plain anger, lol. I was at a school there and young men and women my age (who were teachers!) did not know how the African American diaspora came to be. Meaning they are not taught about the trans Atlantic slave trade as a part of African history.

No, I havent misunderstood you….infact it seems we are both preaching to the choir.
“They are familiar with their own history and culture, so why do the outsiders looking in opinion matter so much to you?”
The point I was trying to make was actually about the fact it is wrong that outsiders are trying to determine what the identity of Egyptians should be and/or refer to them as ‘invaders’.
Like you said, they were forced fed Islam and Arabism, they didnt have a choice in that.
It matters to me because I have heritege there and get a little annoyed when people dismiss modern Egyptians as ‘Arab invaders’.

Ah, so it is personal for you. I can’t tell you how to feel about people you are connected to but I do suggest not letting the “arab invader” accusations affect you. Anger will eat away at you. Those folks are just ill informed, you can try to help them see the error in their views but if they can’t see it for themselves then they are a lost cause. What matters is that YOU know the truth and it is not your responsibility to convince other people of the truth. But keep up the good fight if you have to because eventually someone will be enlightened 😀

Im pretty sure S.O.Y Keita speaks about Africa being natrually diverse. Therefore there hasnt needed to be outside mixture to create the differences in appearence we see in countries like Egypt.
Theres more videos of him that Id suggest checking out to anyone interested in the subject. This man knows his stuff.
It would be good to see some Egyptian scholars/academics talking about the same things, be they black, white or anything inbetween.

If I would have known you were talking about youtube comments then I can understand being upset by the extremely rude comments. I stopped commenting on youtube when I mentioned that a video was telling the truth and some commenters called me racial epithets and one commenter said he would kill me if I was in the US (I never mentioned where I was from and I’m glad I didn’t). Some commenters on youtube.. are a scary bunch but just know it is easy from the rude ones to not have a filter because they are hidden behind the computer screen. I looked at some of the comments and just thought wow..I wonder how many of those people have ever VISITED Kmt. Have talked to people from that country? Have spoken with Eqyptologist who study the history and its people both past and present.

I haven’t watched all of the videos but the fact the submitter knows that Kmt means “Black Land” and has interviewed people who are either from or descend from people from that country shows that her post is honest and well-informed. I can’t wait to watch the rest. Thanks for the links.

Hi DeeDee, I hear you…..yes, youtubers and some forum commentors go all out with rude comments. Of course they shouldnt be taken too seriously.
Its mainly the fact she seems to be of Egyptian heritege herself that is really good. Most people I’ve spoken to who have either done Egyptology or Near Eastern studies have all openly said Kmt means the ‘Black Land’. The debate that seems to rage is if this is in regards to the soil or skin colour and it mainly seems to be something Euro and Afrocentrics argue over, from my experience at least and thats not to discredit Afrocentricity. It has offered a very valid perspective of history and should not be undermined. What I feel is wrong is all we seem to have is these two extremes (afro vs euro) and we need something inbetween; what about the grey areas???
The other thing that doesnt sit well with me is the fact people dismiss actual Egyptians (on forums at least).
While Egypt is in Africa and an African civilisation, that doesnt mean the people all look the same and it doesnt mean Egyptians (ancient or modern) are exactly the same as all other Africans, in appearence, culture and other areas. They should still be able to be proud Africans. In other words, we need to move away from racialising things so much and using colour as the only or main marker.
Its just feeding rasicm. Embrace diversity.

Yes “Egypt” was founded by Africans and was always considered African UNTIL a century after europeans started studying them (i.e., around 1800).

First, ancient “Egyptians” literally called themselves “black”. “Km’t” translates to “Egyptian” in most dictionaries. “Km” translates to black. Now I know many of you will say well it refers to the black soil, but that is only your opinion, so let’s look at this objectively.

Greek historians knew them to be descendants of Osiris the Ethiopian (Nubian) who turned Egypt into a habitable place:
Diodorus: “Osiris being come to the borders of Ethiopia, raised high banks on either side of the river, lest, in the time of its inundation it should overflow the country…” Osiris (Wsr) has the title “km’wr” which means black bull.

No disrespect to the Egyptians of present or Copts, but I don’t understand why they would deny their other ancestry. It is a fact that Egypt was invaded and populated by outsiders multiple times over thousands of years, first by the Hyksos (1700s BC) , Persians (525-330 BC), Greeks remember when Alexander the built Alexandria, and made Egypt his home c. 300 BC?), Romans (30 BC-641 AD), Ottomans (1517-1867 AD). Anyone who knows Egypt’s history knows that it has been under foreign rule SINCE 525 BC, and some of you ignorantly contend modern Egyptians are the same as the ancients? LOL.

Egyptians where mostly a mix of Middle Eastern and Black African descent. Some of the suggestion made are simply by racist people. To suggest that white people went around painting the hieroglyphics to make them look more white is crazy! There are text all over the place that describe the Egyptians as fairer then black people indicating the mix. Also copper skinned is not black copper more accurately describes Middle Easterners skin tone. Many documents other than paintings on wall exist that show pictures with varying skin tones anyone who does not except these various forms of evidence as proof of the mixed culture is simply being racist. For thousands of years the Egyptians held the Hebrews (Jews) as slaves. These slaves as well as the slaves from the southern regions in Africa are the people who helped build the pyramids. the various rulers of Egypt have been painted on tombs and papyrus as having various colors of skin so to argue the culture is only black or white is silly. Most Egyptian scholars regardless of race agree the culture has always been mixed. The debate is amongst outsiders of the country who are looking for a pride booster. Many of these pictures date back 4,000 plus years old. yes many countries invaded Egypt from around the 500 BC period. However much older documents suggest so called (non Africans) have been a part of their society for thousands of years prior to 500 BC.

Now for my opinion after studying Egyptian history most of my life I believe that Egypt early on quickly became a country comprised of people from all over the region if you remember ancient history many cultures were tribal both black and white at the time of the start of the Egyptian civilization I believe this mixture of cultures is what made Egypt so successful and long lasting . This mix of culture probably accounts for the emphases of pictures on their language.

One other note in reference to the comments made here the Mesopotamian culture was the root of Greece culture and in turn Roman culture. Although the Egyptians were no doubt a great civilization their contributions came later, after all the oldest pyramid in Africa is well over 400 years newer than the ancient Mesopotamian pyramid type structures. Also if you compare the earliest art work of Egypt to that of the Mesopotamian art that is dated 2,000 years older (not talking about cave drawings but art on infrastructure) there are some similarities indicating to me and others who study these cultures that Egypt like so many other great civilization were influenced by the many cultures around them. based on everything I mentioned I do not think it is far fetched to believe that tribal people in countries north of Egypt as well as the tribal people south of Egypt occupied the land at similar times and formed one society which is now known as ancient Egypt.

Good catch! I meant to say hundreds of years I wrote thousands because the the time frame thousands of years ago, early on, before various civilizations came in and took over. The slaves were around 1444-1250 BC and were not freed until around 900-700 BC the dates are debated by scholars they were slave for about 420 years if anyone is interested to know. Point being within about 1500 years from the start of the first dynasty there is concrete evidence through diggings and historical documents that large amounts of middle eastern people were in one way or another involved in Egyptian society.”the last pharaoh” of Egypt Cleopatra came from a Greek family.

It’s not really an argument, it is what we know so far based on carbon dating of objects and infrastructure consistent with an organized established civilization. I may love Egypt but I accept what we know of the facts of history first. If we keep digging maybe things will change.

Goldfire,
Although the oldest skulls discovered at this time were found in Ethiopia their is no evidence of a civilization existing there this early on a Civilization is an advanced state of human society, in which a high level of culture, science, industry, and government has been reached.with this definition in mind the Mesopotamian civilization predates the Egyptian civilization by anywhere from 5,000 – 4,000 years

Hello! First Id just like to say wonderful thread it has put forth alot of the speculation in perspectives of understanding and answers many common questions. To others id like to say why are you saying ancient egypt was an african society? As if egypt has just packed its belongings and moved elsewhere? Egypt is still in Africa. Anyone who lives in africa, is bloodlined african, or is from africa is african. Not caucasian. Why? because people from africa or with african bloodlines are africans & called that cause it is where they are from. I believe everyone originated in africa from Eden. However thats another topic. I think that the Caucasians are egocentric about ancient egypt being as whites & not black because any white person who thinks that way is out for the title of all glory and all great. They can only get away with that because of the damaged sculptures giving them reason to “rebuild” & make a “potential” figure of what was. however they have no proof its a reconstruction!! Second because the paintings were all different colors so they are able to say this picture of this egyptian is white so they were white the others are slaves. But no, not at all true. Whites are white because of where they live and they live in northern areas where sun isnt that intense as opposed to africans who are darker which is a natural skin protectant from sun. I say this because if you put a Caucasian in africa without sunscreen, they will surely burn up. So how do they think they wouldve survived living there then without sunscreen? they couldnt! Anyway just because there was apinting of lighter people didnt mean they lived or were from egypt. maybe they were just visiting. But no one ever thinks of things like that because egocentrics think with their eyes not their brains. No one was there who is living now unless you find a reincarnation but other than that all we can do is guess. As for phenotypes… get real .I am from Luxor Egypt and I have what some would call “white features” but my skin is colored of an indian from india. Phenotypes meaning features on the outside do not determine genetics. Alot of people look alike & are from totally different ethnic backgrounds. SO that eliminates that thought. Until someone can find a slab stating “We ancient egyptians were black or white” no one has right to ‘claim’ anything. If it is that important though im sure you can get DNA tests & im sure most whites would fail just from the truth of there are no white people of africa who are from there originally in this age.

“Ramesses III
According to a genetic study in December 2012, Ramesses III, second Pharaoh of the Twentieth Dynasty and considered to be the last great New Kingdom king to wield any substantial authority over Egypt, belonged to Y-DNA haplogroup E1b1a, mainly found in sub-saharan Africa.[22]”

Of course, as I’ve stated in comments in other sections some months back, neither Y-DNA nor mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), as viewed separately from autosomal DNA, can be taken as indicators of an individual’s race. However, if it holds that the above haplogroup ‘E1b1a’ indeed is the Y-DNA haplogroup of Ramses III, then there is a strong possibility that he descended from a ‘mainland’ African male. [Mitochondrial DNA is passed from mother to child; Y-DNA is passed from father to son only.]

To the anonymous person who said:” ‘whites’ do have a reason to claim Ancient Egypt was not originally ‘black’. Whites had to find a way to morally justify to the world and to themselves that ‘black’ people were inferior. Claiming that ‘black’ people never contributed anything to mankind was one of the them.
This topic is a big deal for whites cause Egyptian ideas gave birth to ancient Greece and then ancient Rome. If this is shown to be true it shows that centuries of racist perceptions to be unjustified.”

This is racist. Some whites want to feel they are superior or that racism is justified. But to say ‘whites think this’ is just as bad as saying ‘blacks think x’ As a white person I have no desire to feel superior to anyone because of race – ,we’re all just human on a sliding scale from ‘black’ to ‘white’ anyway!

Btw, I think this post is good. So much stuff about ancient Egyptians on the web is written by either white supremacists or black supremacists. This is balanced and sensible, and based on evidence not prejudice.

Who ever put the above article togerther has got most of his information all mixed up . ” Egyptians considered themselves a different race ” When did he
interview any of them ? The egyptian language has definite African Bantu origins . Ta Seti was the first ” egyptian culture” to be established and it’s people
came up from the interior of Africa . So why is it such a mystery as to what the original ” Race ” the egyptians were . This ongoing insanity to create and maintain a mysterious race of Egyptians that are so different from black africans is just another historical carry over of the illogical and ridiculous eurocentric white supremacist ideas about classifying races on the african continent .
Now is the time for Africans to wrestle Egyptology from the clutches of the distorters of our civilization, by a more forceful and public attack on their lies. We must expose to the light of truth, every falsification and every claim of a European or Asian origin of Kemit and re-establish the link with our ancestors for the sake of our children

Well, whatever the race of the ancient Egyptians might have been, the face of Sphinx certainly shows marked prognathism — a distinctly ‘Negroid’ / non-‘Caucasoid’ trait as stormfront types love to point out ….

It is so amazing that so many on this page is so damn ignorant about the versitility of the African race of people . I dare anyone on this page to prove
to me that any where on this earth past and present that they show where
Black folks all looked alike . Why in the world should ancient Egypt that’s in Africa be any different ?

Ken Willims, if your snotty comment was in reference to my post, kindly point out specific examples of my “ignorance” (you have a nerve!), and, while you’re at it, point out where I used the words “Black” or “African”, and where I made a reference to “all Blacks” in ANY context. Also, while you’re at it, work on your reading comprehension

This is why it upsets me so when I hear ancient Hebrews were white supremacist becuse they had a high percentage of Egyptian mixed descents Joseph was married to an Egyptian women and his descendants were mixed Moses was mixed and his wife was a woc I could go on and name more biblical figures that were black but I be here for a long time so…

@despina
“Egyptians” shaved their heads before burial…and in general kept no body hair whatsoever. After death, hair ceases to grow, and so any hair on a mummy is a wig, which was often glued to the scalp, and any Egyptologist knows this.

Modern Greeks and ancient Greeks circa the era of Herodotus are not the same. The ancient Greeks recognised their admixture with both African and European blood, and often portrayed themselves with brown skin (which you would see had not European museums whitewashed ancient Greek art). They also admitted that they believed Greek civilisation sprang from the settlement of Egyptian colonists.

Since then, Greece has changed drastically, and there have been several major foreign occupations of and migrations by Greeks out of Greece.

“resw77,
After death, hair ceases to grow, and so any hair on a mummy is a wig, which was often glued to the scalp, and any Egyptologist knows this.”

Linda says,

Good point… and also to add, the Egyptians (and other Africans) used Henna to darken the hair and Henna turns the hair Red, especially grey hair… so that natural “red” hair came from the natural bushes.

How do you arrive at “20% to 30%”? Even if you were right, it would mean that modern Greeks are still not the same as the ancients.

But, a recent DNA study of the most ancient Greeks (Minoans) showed that they most commonly shared haplogroup H, which has its highest frequency among the Tuaregs of Africa. Although H is also quite common in other parts of Europe, it is least common among modern Greeks and other southeastern Europeans.

Diodorus (a Sicilian Greek) even told us about some Africans who came to Greece:

“Moreover, certain of the rulers of Athens were originally Egyptians…Erechtheus also, who was by birth an Egyptian, became king of Athens…in proof…Once when there was a great drought…Erechtheus, through his racial connection with Egypt, brought from there to Athens a great supply of grain…”

This ongoing insanity and agony to create and maintain a mysterious race of Ancient Egyptians that are so different from Black Africans is illogical and ridiculous .

The egyptian language has definite African Bantu origins . Ta Seti acording to physical evidence was no doubt the first ” egyptian culture” to be established and it’s people
The egyptian language has definite African Bantu origins . Ta Seti was the first ” egyptian culture” to be established and it’s people
came up from the interior of Africa .

So why is it such a mystery as to what the original ” Race ” the egyptians were .
came up from the interior of Africa .

So why is it such a mystery as to what and who the original ” Race ” the egyptians were ? The Black African race has always been a people of diversity .

You’re right, and Cheikh Ante Diop even proved that the Kemetic language was related to Wolof and ancient Kemetic cultural practices were similar to what we find all over traditional Africa today (but completely opposite the ancient Greek/European practices).

Egyptologists know the truth, but admitting it forces revised thought about Africans’ place in history, and threatens both funding for these archaeological excavations and tourism to Egypt.

I think the problem is with the question. Here is what I would ask? Who started the Egyptian civilization? Who built the first pyramids in Egypt. The answer is pretty simple. The indigenous people of that area, who were black. Period. (I’m not sure why people have such a hard time believing this. Think of the Incas and the Mayan civilization and their architecture and progress in science and astronomy. Both were indigenous and didn’t have much contact with the outside world) Now if you ask the question was Egypt a black civilization then the question starts to get a bit complex. As Egypt started to get rich and as trade picked up, it became a target of invaders. You will notice this with the change in the features of paintings and drawings in Ancient Egyptian artifacts. But even then I wouldn’t say the ruling class was pure “brown”. I think race was less of an issue in the ancient world. But one thing is clear, till Alexander conquered Egypt I would say it was a black empire and then a black-brown empire. Finally, I’m going to teach my child about all the ancient, ancient civilization. I believe they were way more progressive then we were, had an inclination for science, feared mother earth and worshiped her, and lived in quite an equal society, with women revered for the power to sustain life.

I personally think that the whole concept of race is the reason why this question gets into such quackmire. Race, as we today understand it, did not exist at the time of egyptian greatness. Anyone who has been in Egypt and watched those paintings and descriptions on stone of the people of Egypt, or of the ruling pharaos and ruling class, can see that the whole issue of race of egyptians is the invention of our times. For the egyptians of old it was not an issue at all. Some of their pharaos were black in every sense of the word, some were more of a mediterannen look, some of their wives were dark and some very pale, some of the soldiers were black and some not, servants came from every “race” possible etc.

What is the point in this discussion, and what should be the very point, is the fact that no matter what “complexion” egyptians were or what “race” we like to give them 6000 years after the fact, they were africans. The Old Egypt was african. Period.

It is only today, when we are so immersed into racism and its racial concepts, we try to convince ourselves that race was an important issue for them too, or that race is The question about Egypt. And this has been so since the white europeans began to white wash Egypt in 1800’s and tried to prove that it was not an african civilization.

The only fact that matters to me, and it matters very much more than the assumed skin color or thickness of lips of the egyptians, is that Egypt was an african civilization. Period.

I think there is a reason why egyptian civilization is been seen as the proto type of african civilizations, and why some wish to see it as either originating from central Africa or giving cultural influence over the whole continent. The reason for this is that we are so accustomed to think trough domination of the “western”/american culture these days that we assume that Egypt was somehow the USA of those times and there fore influenced everything and everyone in Africa. This was not true.

I think it is very narrow way to look at Africa, the most diverse and complex continent in the planet. Africa has produced many civlizations and has much more diverse cultural spheres than any other continent. To claim that Egypt at its peak somehow dominated the whole continent is underestimating the continent and its size and people.

If there were the phoenicians, greeks, romans and finally the “europeans” on the north side of Mediterannean sea, there were dozens or hundreds of nations, kingdoms, empires, cultures in Africa at the same time.

Egypt might have looked as the only game in town (well, the other game in town since nubians were also in sight) when looked from the northern side of Mediterannean or from Asia, but looking from the African continent, it was just one show going on up north. I think we should remember this when we think about Egypt and its huge impact on the western world, and when we think about the people of Egypt.

Just add to my previous post. When people say whites built the Ancient civilization that in itself is so wrong. Many “Europeans” themselves didn’t consider Greeks, Italians or Spanish as “whites”. The fact remains even today these countries can never really call themselves “whites”. They are way, way, way too mixed for that. Why do you think the Nazi’s thought these Mediterranean countries as an inferior race. ( Sorry to bring up the Nazis) The real interaction with the whites ( that the Romans called Barbarians) started only after the long decline of the Egyptian empire. Additionally, for a long period of time, the Egyptians didn’t really have contact with the outside world because they were highly self sustained because of the Nile. Lastly, as I stressed again, when the Spanish invaded the Americas the Incas had been in spectacular decline, despite the fact that they had vast reserves of natural resources. But the true extent of the progress especially in science, astronomy and maths of that civilization baffles even the most learned. How do you think that happened? Lucky for them because of geography they will never have people claiming that the Incas were actually bunch of white people masquerading as native Americans!

Honestly I think the ancient Egyptians were Black. They may have had some Arab admixture but I doubt it would dilute their African features very much. There was no way that the Egyptians were White as depicted on TV. It was in Africa, for crying out loud!

I have proof too. The ancient Israelites were Black people and were confused for Egyptians in the Old and New Testament of the Bible.

(http://sarabe3.tripod.com/israeliteimages.html)
This is the best link yet. It shows the images that ancient nations such as Assyrians, Babylonians etc had of ancient Israelites. And their appearance looked like Black African people too.

The so called Jews today aren’t descendants of the Biblical Jews at all. Askenazi Jews, which makes up most of today’s Jewry, are actually Gentiles. Genesis 10:3 backs my claim. Askenazi is the son of Gomer, who was the grandson of Japheth, one of Noah’s sons. Japheth’s descendants are considered Gentiles not Israelites.

A rather worthless afrocentric point of view here-the ancient Egyptians never painted themselves as negriods. They differenciated themselves through their statues and artwork. Also DNA supports the ancient and modern Egyptians are the same. So a personal opinion from the author who wished the ancient Egyptians were negriods
The book of the dead is a classic example of how the ancient Egyptians viewed themselves. The negroid Maiherpi-the fan bearer to the Pharoah is painted jet black with nappy hair and the Egyptians red or yellow with straight hair.

Let’s all remember what the great Dr. Ivan Van Sertima said about The ancient
African contribution to world history . ” We as Black people have the right and the duty to reclaim our history that was taken from us and more importantly to
set the record straight ” . I personally don’t understand why all Black Folk can’t
simply adhere to those common sense principals about solving ” this problem ”
about the identity of who were the Ancient Egyptians . We need to stop completly using racial identification standards created by our enemies to keep
us divided intellectually and so confused that we can’t never move forward with
this dilemma . I will say this again and again : Now is the time for Africans to wrestle Egyptology from the clutches of the distorters of our civilization, by a more forceful and public attack on their lies. We must expose to the light of truth, every falsification and every claim of a European or Asian origin of Kemit and re-establish the link with our ancestors for the sake of our children.

I thought we had some help with Morsi as leader in Egypt, since he acknowledges his partial “Nubian” heritage and promised to help displaced Nubians return to their homelands…but looks like he just got ousted.

Just because Morsi acknowledges his partial Nubian does not necessarily mean he is going to help Nubians, it could transpare that he was using them to meet his politicals as many past Egyptian have done in past as histroy as taught us. Pee

Was this ment to be racest? xD
I don’t think racist American slave owners could have known what real anchent Egyptians looked like, because to me atleast modern anchen Egyptians look like a mix of black and white, and that 10 percent law no longer is in existence of any country lol, you act like it is still in effect today, and for any one here that is racest… Humans are all more than 99.99 percent related we are the most related species on the planet even fruit flies have more diversity than humans in relation to each other which is a little less then 80 percent, the only way humans are different are in the skin… But every one has thier own personality no matter where thier from or what color they are… And it’s sad how somewhat racist articles and things like this come up, it should not matter what color any one is.

africans are all shades of brown… from light to dark even some shades of white. africans have all shades. plus it really don`t matter because all races have some african blood….. all races. egypt is in africa….. African blood.

I for one believe that the ancient Egyptians were what we call black today. They share the same culture. They share the same burial rites. Language can be argued to have African roots. Its strange that some people attempt to portray Africans as being some how trapped in South Africa. As if they just stayed South or migrated WEST. While its simple human nature to follow the WATER. The Nile river flowed up so why would people assume that the africans just stayed south.

Africans, when using Biology have the most diverse GENES on the planet. That can not be argued. Why then, would we/people assume that they have to look a certain way?

I read another poster state: Well they are not black and they are not white..they are Egyptian. Really, i would suspect that those same people who claim this are attempting to mask their true beliefs. And are in fact hiding behind the ENGLISH language…..

“It is not me who is obsessed with skin color of people…..its YOU”—I could not tell consider all your post have consisted of “he is white get over it.” If you were not then this would not be your….oh I lost count..post declaring the whiteness of said individuals. 🙂

“This post is all about your obsession with skin color and how anything that white is bad and anything black is good.”—Yet no one said any of this so I take it you are projecting though most if not all of your posts were anyway.

“Here are the facts concerning these fictional characters
Santa=White
The Lone Ranger=White
St.Nicholas=White”

Well that is simply your opinion though I doubt you can depict the difference between the two. Here are a few facts though

Santa= fictional character that can be any color
The Lone Ranger=fictional character that can be any color (though evidence suggests he is not white only that the man in the book is white and is Captain Hughes).
St. Nicholas=Not white by your American standards of race (he is brown).

Actual Facts:
Egyptians—“Kemp states that the “black/white argument is understandable as a symptom of modern political expression … The over-simplified choice that it offers, however, does not lead to an appropriate evaluation of such evidence and understanding as we have.”[17] The 2001 Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt states that “Any characterization of race of the ancient Egyptians depends on modern cultural definitions, not on scientific study.”
“Recent DNA studies of Ancient Egyptian mummies of a New Kingdom dynasty have confirmed Sub-Saharan African origins for notable New Kingdom pharoahs from both the Rameses III (from 1186 B.C.) and Amarna (from 1353 B.C.) lineages: In December 2012, Zahi Hawass, the former Egyptian Minister of State for Antiquities Affairs and his research team released DNA studies of Rameses III (who historically is assumed to have usurped the throne and as such may not represent earlier lineages) and his son have found he carried the Sub-Saharan African Haplogroup E1b1a, and as a result clustered most closely with Africans from the African Great Lakes (335.1), Southern Africa (266.0) and Tropical West Africa (241.7) and not Europeans (1.4), Middle Easterners (14.3) or peoples from the Horn “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Egyptian_race_controversy

As I said only morons believe and put a race to it.

“Deputy Marshall Reeves=Black”—No one said he was not black.

“Now lets stop the derailment of this thread.”—Oh but after you. I sure getting your azz handed to you each post can be quite painful. 🙂

is funny but europeans were still cromagnon cave dwellers at the time of the ancient egyptian delvelopment and their highest civilazation period. Since egypt developed the culture and civilization that later civilazed the modern world and the svages that lived in europe via the greeks who took their civillizaton from the egyptians. It is very easy not to accept the truth when it is hitting you in the face. It is obvious that the europeans that came to America were very distructive here as well as in Europe where they knew nothing but war and destruction. It is a fact that the world is this mess because of Europen hands that are in control and continue to destroy. Do not cover the truth with nonesense

We need to wake up people . The History Channel is never going to admit that
Ancient Kemetians ( egypt ) was conceived , created , and maintained by honest to goodness Black Africans . I think between the bank accounts of people like Ophra , Tyler , Jzee, and Beyounce , us negro folk could have our
own History Channel . But with this group mental make up matrix , that reality
will never happen . I’ll bet Tom Hanks would go for it .

Yikes. You have taken some massive liberties with this post. Much is plain wrong. I appreciate that you limit your words, but you should be more careful how you spin the limited info you provide. Is it more important to spread your opinion or the truth? Have another look at the Old Testament. It’s clear you are little confused.

Black people- and by Black I mean the descendants of sub Sahara blacks who were brought to north America as slaves, are so desperate to feel better about their lowly heritage, they try to appropriate a history that isn’t theirs. It would be like the Irish trying to claim ancestors built the Roman coliseum, because they are part of Europe too. Very transparent and sad, not to mention embarrassing. Even if there was truth to the belief, the slaves brought to America, we’re from sub saharan tribes on the mostly southern west coast of Africa.

The ancient Egyptians were black. black is not an American construct at all. The Arabs of the prophet muhammad (saas) and later considered their color to be the same as that of the Ethiopians and East Africans. They called this color black in comparison to the whiteness of the Persians, Greco-Romans and other Europeans. You even stated how those ancient Greeks considered those people black. The Arabs also called many of the Indians who are the same color as many black Africans, black. The Arabs strictly amongst themselves used black only to refer to people whose colors were actually close to the true black. Just as Black Americans do.

As for Destroy Ignorance who is actually promoting ignorance blackness is not limited to Africa or African genetics, it is a color. You have straight haired blacks and kinky haired blacks and in some places you can find both hair types within the same black people. The Irish were white, as the Romans were (although the Romans had a tan from having some black ancestry), this is in comparison to the darker peoples of the planet. So both were white just as Ancient Egyptians, Ancient true blooded Arabs, many Berbers, Papua New Guineans, Melanesians and black Africans are all blacks, despite varying shades.!!!!

From the Cave of Swimmers, Sahara Desert, Egypt near the Syrian border. Neolithic pictographs (rock painting images) clearly portrays Black Africans swimming. They are estimated to have been created 10,000 years ago during the time of the most recent Ice Age.Substantial portions of the cave have been irreversibly damaged by visitors over the years. Fragments of the paintings have been removed as souvenirs, and some surfaces have cracked after water was applied to ‘enhance’ their contrast for photographs. The Cave of the Swimmers, Egypt. figures are about the size of a human hand. The cave and rock art was discovered in 1933 by László Almásy. The Neolithic rock paintings of people swimming, estimated to have been made 10,000 years ago during the most recent Ice Age. When found many people did not believe they could represent actual swimmers. In 2007,Eman Ghoneim discovered an ancient Mega-Lake (30,750 km²) buried beneath the sand of the Great Sahara in the Northern Darfur region, Sudan.

Perhaps you can start by destroying your ignorance. People did move all over. They did not remain in one area over time. You are drawing a conclusion based on two different time periods to mean one group can not be from another.

A race of men now rejected for their black skin and woolly hair founded on the study of the laws of nature, those civil and religious systems which still govern the universe.” (Count C.F. Volney, esteemed French academician, 1787).

A EUROPEAN’S CONVICTION THAT ANCIENT KHEMET (EGYPT) WAS A BLACK AFRIKAN CIVILIZATION
‘’When I visited the Sphinx, I could not help thinking the figure of that monster furnished the true solution of the enigma.” ‘Still, enough of the original face remained for Volney to conclude that its stony features “were precisely those of a Negro” and that the ancient Egyptians themselves must have been “real Negroes, of the same species with all the natives of Africa.” As for the modern Egyptians, with their “yellowish dusky complexion” and mulatto” appearance, Volney concluded that “after mixing for so many ages with the Greeks and Romans, they have lost the intensity of their first colour, yet they still retain strong marks of their original conformation” “how are we astonished…when we reflect that to the race of negroes, at present our slaves and the objects of our extreme contempt, we owe our arts, sciences, and even the very use of speech; and when we recollect that, in the midst of those nations who call themselves the friends of liberty and humanity, the most barbarous of slaveries is justified; and that it is even a problem whether the understanding of negroes be of the same species with that of white men”. “The Ruins: or a Survey of the Revolution of Empires…in the pages of ‘The Ruins’, that Volney firmly concluded that civilization had been first conceived “on the borders of the Upper Nile, among a black race of men. Western civilization indeed owes its existence largely to Black Africans…Volney wrote in a time before archaeology and anthropology became proper sciences.”

Volney of course wasn’t the only European to think so as you probably know. Before the ‘Scramble for Africa’ commenced, there were others such as Champollion who thought along similar lines. They are starting to find archeological ‘evidence'(probably suppressed before), that Egypt started out as a black civilization and was for most of it’s greatest epochs(‘d say up until the mid 18th dynasty). Many of the oldest gods originated in Nubia such as Osiris. That should tell these Europeans something right there but they are obtuse to anything which would make the Egyptians racialized.

1974 Unesco Conference On Ancient Egypt Origins
The question of “What race were the ancient Egyptians?” was emphatically resolved at the historic international Cairo Symposium, held from January 28 – February 3, 1974. The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) convened 20 of the world’s top Egyptologists to debate the race of the founders of ancient Egyptian civilization.[1]
Until this symposium, it was assumed by the vast majority of European Egyptologists that the ancient Egyptians were either Caucasians or western Asiatics. Outside of Black scholars, few writers in the world agreed that the people of pharaonic Egypt were black Africans. At the Cairo Symposium only two African scholars, Cheikh Anta Diop and Theophilé Obenga, held that the Egyptians were black Africans, while the other participants took opposing positions against the Diop-Obenga thesis. Their scholarly opponents offered virtually no evidence to substantiate the two long-held popular theories of the western Asiatic or Caucasoid origin of the ancient Egyptians. These popular theories certainly needed to be proven, because they are contradicted by all of the objective evidence, such as the temple and tomb reliefs, paintings, sculpture, written records of other nations, linguistic terms, mummy remains, Egyptian customs, and royal and spiritual symbols.[2]
Armed with a formidable body of evidence from numerous
academic
disciplines, Diop presented specific information to prove the black origins of Kemet (ancient Egypt ). It is obvious from the conference report that Diop dominated the proceedings, and confronted with his solid arguments, most of the participants changed their positions during the conference.
Prof. Torgny Save-Soderbergh ( Sweden ) and other participants argued that the concept of race was now outmoded and not appropriate for characterizing the ancient Egyptians. Prof. Abdelgadir Abdalla ( Sudan ) stated that it was more important to focus on the ancient Egyptian achievements rather than their race. Prof. G. Ghallab ( Egypt ) stated that the Egyptians were “Caucasoids.” However, the theory of an ancient population which was “white” with dark or black pigmentation was abandoned during the conference, as there was no evidence given to prove this assertion.
Professors El Nadury ( Egypt ) and Grottanelli ( Italy ) argued that the Egyptian population was not a pure race and could only be regarded as “mixed.” Prof. Jean Vercoutter ( France ) remarked that “ Egypt was African in its way of writing, in its culture, and in its way of thinking.” He stated, however, that “the inhabitants of the Nile Valley had always been mixed.”
Prof. Jean Leclant ( France ) added that there was an “African character in the Egyptian temperament and way of thinking” but that the “unity of the Egyptian people was not racial but cultural.” He stated the civilization was “neither white nor Negro.” Prof. Peter Shinnie ( Canada ), Vercoutter and others argued that terms such as “black” was too subjective and not well defined.
Dr. Diop protested that these were not positive arguments presenting any evidence, but simply negative statements against his black African origins position. In fact Maurice Glélé, the neutral UNESCO representative, interjected on at least two occasions to state that if classifying people in terms of white, black, or yellow are so debatable and subjective then a revision should be made of the entire terminology of world history to avoid misconceptions. It is clear that the participants abandoned the old Caucasoid and western Asiatic theories and instead retreated to a new “mixed race” position, without presenting any meaningful evidence to support this new theory.
Nevertheless, the conclusion of the official UNESCO report indicates the triumph of Diop and his colleague Obenga. It stated, “Although the preparatory working paper sent out by UNESCO gave particulars of what was desired, not all participants had prepared communications comparable with the painstakingly researched contributions of Professors Cheikh Anta Diop and Obenga. There was consequently a real lack of balance in the discussions.”[3] In laymen terms, Cheikh Anta Diop and Theophilé Obenga gave out an important academic spanking on a world stage. Western Egyptologists now unsuccessfully try and downplay the significance of Diop’s triumph over their colleagues.

Yeah, Osiris was in the Igbo language , from many words that Nigerian professor mentioned…

forget about Egypt, I want to know about this profound knowledge that was way before that , coming from as varied ethnicities as the Igbo and Pygmies, who were noted in Egypt 4000 years ago , for their dancing …now how far back could anyone imagine that really could be, when these concepts could have evolved…?..maybe many of thousands of years ago more than Egypt noted the dancing of the Pygmies, and their culture was portable…concepts tied together with other ethnicities in Africa like the Igbo and from the congo…kenya..senegal..ganda, tanzania ..uganda etc etc, these concepts are tied into all those areas..I mean how far back could it be that those concepts evolved in those areas..concepts of math, organic expresion of fractals, body control using all the fulcrums in the human body, ability to turn off the thinking brain, and get in touch with intuition and sub conciousness, what scientists say is seconds ahead of our concious brain…here are concepts realised by ancient humans that plugged right into these things , and how to get in touch with them….in a profound way…

Im really interested because they have an absolutly garguantuan affect on cultures all the way down into today….in a big way…certainly as big as any contribution by any society anywhere…certainly as great as the Pyramids…they are constructions that are not physical…they deal from the inside, from the soul , and how these constructions are expressed outward in space and time and sound waves (in the sence that sound waves are important parts in how things evolve in the universe)

Egyptians were Black/Hamites/Chemites, Khemites all mean Black. Cush, Aethiops, Ethiopians all mean Black or Burnt Faces. You need to explain why a settlement of White people would call themselves Black? And why would a settlement of White- Japhetic people worship Black gods? Egyptians worshiped Amon same as Zeus; they were Black gods. Their name means Black. But, when the Greeks adopted the Egyptian gods, they portrayed them as White, because they wanted to worship gods that looked like them. They called their White version Jupiter.

Someone has already explain that:See post about Yoruba, Igbo tribal language.
Egyptians spoke an Afro-Asiatic or Cushitic language according to linguist. This language is not native to Russia nor Europe. All European or Caucasians languages came from the Greeks who created their language from the Phoenician alphabets. Phoenician were descendants of Ham not Japheth. Japhetic people have settlements in cold climatic areas, like Russia and the Caucases Mountain. The Greeks gave their language to all of their descendants of Japheth. It is called Indo-European language family (French, Dutch, Spanish, German etc.) So, if Egyptians where White-Japhitic people, then why so many African tribes’ languages came from the Ancient Egyptians language? Before the Greeks gave the Japhitic race the Indo-Eruopean language which sprung many different forms, Roman historian Tacitus said, the British spoke a barbaric incoherent language. And, Afro-Asiatic language predates Indo-European languages. Therefore, it is impossible for white-Japhitic people to have been the indigenous people of Egypt.

White-Japhetic culture and Black-Hamitic culture are very different. There was no evidence to point to Russia nor Europe when it came to Egyptian culture. White-Japhetic culture was ever a cow-cult, or cultivated watermelon and corn. Which are found on the tombs of Pharaohs? These things are all indigenous to the people of Ham/Black people of Africa and Cushitic/Hamitic/African culture. What about the famous mud brick homes where some Hamitic Africans live. They invented mud bricks and it progressed to the kiln where they cooked their bricks in oven, then to building structures. Show me this same progression coming from Russia, because archaeological finds of Hamitic bricks and pottery are found all over Africa. Ancient historians’ recorded that White-Japhetic people lived in tents and new nothing about architecture until they were taught by the Greeks.

Then, lets not forget these things, White-Japhetic people thought the world was flat, the sun revolved around the earth, but certain African tribes who were from a certain caste (Dogon Mali), Ethiopians, Egyptians, Chaldeans (from Cush), People of the Indus Valley (Cush) and India (Cush) all except the Brahman Caste (Japhetic), new the earth was round, new that earth revolved around the sun. The Egyptians taught this knowledge to the Greeks who studied inside their schools of Mysteries. The Egyptians schools were made of mud bricks or stones. People like Aristotle, and Pythagorean brought their knowledge back to Greece- and were arrested or persecuted. If math originated from the Greeks, then why were they trying to kill Pythagorean? Greeks were not yet ready to grasp mathematical concepts, they thought it was witchcraft. Egyptians used perfumes, Europeans thought was witchcraft, Egyptians had funeral rituals used amongst Africans today. Europeans burnt their dead. There is no evidence that can place White-Japhetic people in Egypt. All White people living in Egypt today, are Hamitic either through mutations (light skin, yellow skin, albino white), or from a mixture of Shemitic people and Japhitic people. This means they descended from Black Hamitic people. There are also yellow and brown people also descended form the Black Hamitic people. I will explain in a later post.

Some of the White people of Egypt are Hamitic-Whites (African). Some are Shemitic Whites (Asian) and some are Japhetic-Whites (Caucasian). Let me explain: some tribes claim lineage through their father, and not skin color like in America. If your father was White-Japhite then your descendants will claim White even though their skin is Black. There is a tribe in West Africa -Timbuktu who claims that they are White. This is very funny to Americans because they look like African-Americans. But, Mexicans claim White too, because of their Spanish white ancestor. Who are we to tell them they are not white, because we view race differently? Egyptians who say they are native Africans, but look White, are talking about their father’s lineage which can trace back to a Hamitic /Black ancestor. But, they get confused when it comes to the original skin color of their ancestor. They say, Egyptians were white, because they are white, not really understanding that Hamitic people were Black -and white skin is a mutation from a black/brown skin- or due to interbreeding with a different white race. Again, I am defining the different white races based off of ancient standards, and not by our modern standards. The rest of the Whites who claim to be White Egyptians are from the 100 or more tribes of Japhetic and Shemitic Arabs who settled in Egypt. And when you look at them, the majority of them are brown. Do yo want to know why? Read my next post.

The Middle East, according to the Bible was settled by the descendants of Shem. The reason why this is important is because many of the Shemitic names used in the Bible are found in ancient history writings and in artifacts during archaeological finds. For example, Shem son’s Ashur called his descendants Assyrians. The Assyrians have been quoted by many ancient historians. So, the Bible’s genealogy cannot be discredited. Descendants of Ham also settled in the Middle East, modern day Iraq/Iran- ancients called Mesopotamia. The Ham descendants in and around Mesopotamia where Canaan sons, and Kush/Cush’s sons. Shem descendants were described by Iranian legends as having dark skin and curly hair. Japhetic white people were described as Olive skin or white. So, dark skin must have meant darker than olive or tanned skinned white people we know of today. When you look at the carvings of the different groups of people, the curls of the men were tight and puffy, which suggest woolly hair. So, the Shemtic people living in the Middle East during ancient times, had woolly hair, just like some of the sons of Ham. Some of the sons of Ham had straight hair. These people are found in India and the Indus Valley and a lot are still in Africa, who were mistakenly called Asians during the European Colonization of Africa.

CAIRIO SYMPOSIUM (1974)
The question of “What race were the ancient Egyptians?” was emphatically resolved at the historic international Cairo Symposium, held from January 28 – February 3, 1974. The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) convened 20 of the world’s top Egyptologists to debate the race of the founders of ancient Egyptian civilization.[1]
Until this symposium, it was assumed by the vast majority of European Egyptologists that the ancient Egyptians were either Caucasians or western Asiatics. Outside of Black scholars, few writers in the world agreed that the people of pharaonic Egypt were black Africans. At the Cairo Symposium only two African scholars, Cheikh Anta Diop and Theophilé Obenga, held that the Egyptians were black Africans, while the other participants took opposing positions against the Diop-Obenga thesis. Their scholarly opponents offered virtually no evidence to substantiate the two long-held popular theories of the western Asiatic or Caucasoid origin of the ancient Egyptians. These popular theories certainly needed to be proven, because they are contradicted by all of the objective evidence, such as the temple and tomb reliefs, paintings, sculpture, written records of other nations, linguistic terms, mummy remains, Egyptian customs, and royal and spiritual symbols.[2]
Armed with a formidable body of evidence from numerous
academic
disciplines, Diop presented specific information to prove the black origins of Kemet (ancient Egypt ). It is obvious from the conference report that Diop dominated the proceedings, and confronted with his solid arguments, most of the participants changed their positions during the conference.
Prof. Torgny Save-Soderbergh ( Sweden ) and other participants argued that the concept of race was now outmoded and not appropriate for characterizing the ancient Egyptians. Prof. Abdelgadir Abdalla ( Sudan ) stated that it was more important to focus on the ancient Egyptian achievements rather than their race. Prof. G. Ghallab ( Egypt ) stated that the Egyptians were “Caucasoids.” However, the theory of an ancient population which was “white” with dark or black pigmentation was abandoned during the conference, as there was no evidence given to prove this assertion.
Professors El Nadury ( Egypt ) and Grottanelli ( Italy ) argued that the Egyptian population was not a pure race and could only be regarded as “mixed.” Prof. Jean Vercoutter ( France ) remarked that “ Egypt was African in its way of writing, in its culture, and in its way of thinking.” He stated, however, that “the inhabitants of the Nile Valley had always been mixed.”
Prof. Jean Leclant ( France ) added that there was an “African character in the Egyptian temperament and way of thinking” but that the “unity of the Egyptian people was not racial but cultural.” He stated the civilization was “neither white nor Negro.” Prof. Peter Shinnie ( Canada ), Vercoutter and others argued that terms such as “black” was too subjective and not well defined.
Dr. Diop protested that these were not positive arguments presenting any evidence, but simply negative statements against his black African origins position. In fact Maurice Glélé, the neutral UNESCO representative, interjected on at least two occasions to state that if classifying people in terms of white, black, or yellow are so debatable and subjective then a revision should be made of the entire terminology of world history to avoid misconceptions. It is clear that the participants abandoned the old Caucasoid and western Asiatic theories and instead retreated to a new “mixed race” position, without presenting any meaningful evidence to support this new theory.
Nevertheless, the conclusion of the official UNESCO report indicates the triumph of Diop and his colleague Obenga. It stated, “Although the preparatory working paper sent out by UNESCO gave particulars of what was desired, not all participants had prepared communications comparable with the painstakingly researched contributions of Professors Cheikh Anta Diop and Obenga. There was consequently a real lack of balance in the discussions.”[3] In laymen terms, Cheikh Anta Diop and Theophilé Obenga gave out an important academic spanking on a world stage. Western Egyptologists now unsuccessfully try and downplay the significance of Diop’s triumph over their colleagues.

[…] the Egyptians UNIVERSALLY have features we'd deem to be Negroid traits? Not really. However, scientifically and culturally, it is the case that the Egyptians were a part-Black people and that there were many cases of having Negroid features present (far from a […]

To be honest the reality of Eygpt being a civilization of people with dark skin is an amazing fact that changes a lot of views a to what the old world and eygpt was actually like. what shocks me is how black civilizations went from such a high profile to what it is today. But there is a fact we are truly forgetting that the so called Europeans had a similar downward spiral in civilization the fall of Rome to the Germanic tribes lead to what they call the dark age. As at the time until renaissance the average European could not read or write while in places in Africa like Timbuktu the could read even the city known for its large number of books. the fact is this shows civilizations rise and fall and they don’t exactly continue to rise this is a perception this generation is losing it simply answers the question as to the poor condition of present day Africans. I conclude by saying we Africans need a new from of renaissance how and when it will happen we might never know.

Ancient Egypt became a noticeable mixed-race nation after periodic successful invasions. Prior to the Greek invasion ancient Egypt was still a predominantly black nation (despite prior invasions by the Hykos, Assyrians and Persians, respectively).

The Khoisan people (Khoi Khoi and San) have the epicantic fold and yellowish skin hue, both of which imply a mostly East Asian phenotype (not genotype).

We, as a modern people, have a lot to learn about ancient history and ethnic groups.

I would not want to take credit for other civilizations . I think the whole idea of taking credit for African Egyptians is to not admit that black africans in ancient times were very Avanced black people. When I watch movies in America about the Jewish people, or the cannanites, or Egyptians or etc. The movies portray the people as white people. According to white people, every ancient civilization was white. It’s amazing to me that even when the evidence is right in their face, they will still deny what they see. I can see why when most black people are judged in a court room, they are found guilty by racist white people. I will add that not all white people are the same, because I have white in laws .

History, especially ancient history, does NOT mean anything to White people unless it validates who they are and what they’ve accomplished. The ancient Kushite (Nubian) civilization was a marvelous civilization, which, in actuality, predated and lasted longer than the ancient Egyptian civilization (3800 BCE to 550 ACE). However, the Kushite civilization is profoundly Black therefore to most White historians or archaeologists it’s not worth talking about. White archaeologists don’t make a big deal if a Kushite (Nubian) king or queen is unearthed. Cultural historian and archaeologist Anthony T. Browder was told the same thing by his White archaeologist peers when he and his archaeological team unearthed the 25th dynasty tomb of Kushite nobleman Karakhamun on the West Bank of Luxor a few years ago.

it is my opinion that white people were more accurate with their descriptions and discoveries before anthropology and archeology became “professions” with the backing of big money, organizations or governments.

Once you start paying people for their work, they tend to search for and find what ever you want them to find instead of whats really there.

thwack, I don’t think you do justice to the argument against blacks reaching the Americas before Columbus. The main objection to that claim I’ve read was that if blacks had done so, they would have left traces of their presence on islands between Africa and the Americas. That claim can be refuted by finding such traces. Mansa Musa claimed that his predecessor, Abubakari Keita II sent two expeditions to the Americas. The last one was made up of 4000 pirogues using sails and oars. Given that such expedition was undertaken by blacks, I doubt that there’s much interest in finding any traces of it. Thor Heyerdahl traveled to Polynesia from Peru on a raft in 1948, so a trip like that could have been made,

A very important point that is lacking from this discussion is what constitutes a West African. This latter point is a typical example of Western ignorance about Africa and its peopleS, there is a no single West African people and much less African. Every country in Africa that straddles the southern parts of the Sahara desert generally (not always) has lighter people in the north and darker in the south in the same way as they did in Ancient Egypt. This idea of putting all West Africans as looking like Nubians (although Nubia was an integral part of Egypt and its history) is completely false and only an invention of Westerners. Several groups be they Fulani (the most extensive group in West and Central Africa), Touareg and other West African berber groups, In Tibous, Habesha (Semitic mix) even darker groups like the Wolof, Sarakollé, Songhay, Hausa often do not have Western specified “Negroid features”nor do the ORIGINAL africans (bushman and pygmies”). By this IGNORANCE of the most basic understanding of Africans and thier diversity in origin in color, there is an attempt to deny Africa of its rightful place in Ancient Egypt’s record long history.

gro jo
thwack, I don’t think you do justice to the argument against blacks reaching the Americas before Columbus. The main objection to that claim I’ve read was that if blacks had done so, they would have left traces of their presence on islands between Africa and the Americas.
————————————————————————————–

Could these “traces” you speak of be genetic?

If white people discovered these “traces” would they tell you?

White people have no problem claiming the Vikings discovered America before Columbus despite a lack of these “traces.?” Their puffery and boosterism of “Kenniwick man” and “Soloutrian man’, “Clovis man…” knows no end.

Where I live the only “traces” of Native Americans left in North America are in the names and spelling we use for the geography.

Do you have evidence for genetic traces? How about artifacts such as statues, pottery, boats,weapons, tools or domesticated animals that shouldn’t be on the other side of the Atlantic. The fact that you put traces in quotation indicates that you find the search for evidence silly. Why?

thwack, your answer is nonsense. I don’t care if you like my attitude or not. I asked you the questions I did because I thought you knew something on the subject. If you do I’ll be glad to hear what you have to say, otherwise I’ll just ignore you. My language was pretty specific and fact based.
Fact #1 Mansa Musa Keita I claimed Abubakari Keita II left with 4000 pirogues and never returned. Fact #2 No evidence that I’m aware of has been found of this expedition. Maybe nobody looked for said evidence. Fact #3 Thor Heyerdahl traveled to Polynesia from Peru on a raft in 1948. Polynesians traveled and colonized wide swaths of the Pacific on boats like the ones Abubakari Keita II used. My question to you stands, you are free to answer or not.

Its hard to know where to start with this article. I realize this is several years old, but such ignorance can’t be allowed to stand without being confronted. Ancient Egyptians were a separate people group mixed from black africans and semitic peoples. Their country DID include black Africans, as well as brown people. You can clearly look at their wall paintings and see that they themselves distinguished skin color. You will see “tan” people, “red” people, and “black” people in the paintings. Except for the period in which Nubia took part of Egypt, the Egyptians however (at least the ruling class for most of their history) were not black nor did they consider themselves such. Whether you agree with what I wrote till now does not really matter, because Western Civilization DID NOT come from Egypt! Egypt, for all its greatness, was a dead end. Western Civilization comes from Greece via Rome and England. America owes no debt to Egypt.

You can confront it, but you did not really dispute it either. It is common sense that they distinguished skin color, but a difference in skin color does not equate to race.

“Except for the period in which Nubia took part of Egypt, the Egyptians however (at least the ruling class for most of their history) were not black nor did they consider themselves such.”—They also did not consider themselves white or Asian or any other race that people wish to categorize them as. For the most part they were a mixed race and by todays standards would be black. You may be able to claim white during the time of roman rule, but overall it seems silly to claim a person black today by the 1 drop rule and then later try to deny a group is black for whatever gain you seek.

If you indeed trace back far enough western civilization has it’s roots in Egypt. An article was written on this, but I will have to find it to post it.

Here’s a site that discusses Kmt by using the latest research, not throwing tired worn out white supremacist canard about a non-indigenous African origin and peopling of the Nile Valley. They were Africans.

“Except for the period in which Nubia took part of Egypt, the Egyptians however…were not black nor did they consider themselves such”

Well, they did in fact call themselves black people. Western scholars largely agree that the hieroglyph that appears in the description of Egyptian people means black.

“Western Civilization comes from Greece via Rome and England. ”

And Greek civilisation largely comes from Egypt via Egyptian colonists in Greece and Greek expats in Egypt. You just chose a much later starting point in history.

Didorus said: “Even the Athenians, they say, are Colonists from Sais in Egypt”

And as Herodotus said, “Almost all the names of the gods came into Greece from Egypt…. there are many other practices whereof I shall speak hereafter, which the Greeks have BORROWED from Egypt”

@”America owes no debt to Egypt.”

Then why does America pay so much tribute to Egypt?

@sharinalr

“For the most part they were a mixed race and by todays standards would be black.”

Perhaps a bit in later years after the invasions of Hyksos, Hittites, Greeks, Persians and Romans., but in the civilisation’s long history, it was largely African, not mixed, and the royal blood lines came from the South, not outside of Africa.

I find the ancient Egypt race issue hilarious. When it comes to the historical race of countries and empires on the continents of what we called today Europe or Asia there is no question that these people were of Caucasoid or mongoliod decent and no one will even consider the involvement of Negriod or the mixture of Negriod Involvement in these histories( Except for the Moores in Spain which is downed played concerning there Negriod background. Hence OTHELLO ). But when it comes to the race of a people in a civilization on the continent of Africa all of a sudden it is unknown , inconclusive , ambiguous , doesn’t matter , but God forbid they are Negriod. Amazing. The person who commented that people are only interested in ancient Egypt is because white folks are , is 100% correct. The reason they are interested is because they believe intelligence is defined through material constructs and the larger and more elaborate the constructs the more intelligent you must be. It is this misguided assumption that led them to oppress , exploit , Robb , destroy and showed utter contempt towards those who they believed to be primitive , meaning not having respectable buildings , ships , weapons , and wealth , in accordance to their values which are in the importance of material achievements. They are not interested in a people who lived in a social structure of harmony , of sharing , of peace , of respectable co existence with nature or neighbors. If these people didn’t build large stone constructs or shown to have made large military conquest and all they did was live in grass huts or teepees and farmed and hunt then these people did nothing significant and therefore are unintelligent. So this is the reason why all the history through out Africa and through out the world gets overlooked or trivialized . Now that today’s world has been conditioned in holding material achievements of sole importance then the ancient Egyptian material constructs becomes a battle of claim , and since it’s on a continent that was told to the wold to be the home of a race of people that are primitive , savages and unintelligent , well then this becomes a problem.

I am not stating anything racist here, just factual. I’ve have spent a good amount of time throughout Egypt recently and can tell you this, blacks were only in ancient Egypt as slaves, nothing more and this has even been depicted on ancient Egyptian Hyroglyphics in the temple of Luxor and other places. The masterminds of ancient Egyptian civilization were not black but rather berbers who were brown. Even today whether you are in Cairo where the Giza pyramids are or at Abu Simbel near the Sudanese border, you will find that ethnic Egyptians are not blacks/negroes but berbers. These people (including the Nubians of the far South near Sudan) have brown skin and do not possess the wide noses or the fuzzy hair that Blacks do. It is a fact that when Europeans first arrived in Sub Saharan Africa that the wheel had not yet been created there. In fact Afrocentrists have tried to take credit for what the moors did when they conquered Spain who were were also not black but berbers as well. Here is a link providing further facts on why the ancient Egyptians were not blackhttp://www.ambrosekane.com/2014/05/16/the-myths-blacks-believe-the-ancient-egyptians-were-negroes-and-built-the-grand-pyramids/

I will comment at length in more time, but the link you provided does not claim a fact or present one. What is does show is Eurocentric nonsense. It fails to present nothing more than an opinion that lacks this DNA evidence that you claim it has.

“I am not stating anything racist here, just factual. I’ve have spent a good amount of time throughout Egypt recently and can tell you this, blacks were only in ancient Egypt as slaves, nothing more and this has even been depicted on ancient Egyptian Hyroglyphics in the temple of Luxor and other places”—Unless Luxor is the only temple in Egypt then I doubt it is ample proof to support the claim that blacks were only in Egypt as slaves. There were some in their as slaves but research shows other groups outnumbered blacks as slaves.

Secondly here you can not define or categorize Egyptians of the past in the same light as Egyptians today. Mainly because Egypt was conquered at different points in history that resulted in mixing. The most recent Egyptians are a mixture of Arabs. Egypt was conquered by Arabs at some point.

Egypt was no way built by Africans. Egypt is in Northern of Africa Continent but the Egyptians were not Africans.. Pharaohs had golden skin not black (May be by Ethiopan-Europeans or Indo-Europeans). Ethiopians have White features except skin. How about the Pyramids in MAYA? Were those pyramids built by Africans too?

Some of the Black folks who go around and fight with others and claim that ancient great civilization such as Egypt was built by their ancestors their is purely racist.

Listen to Dr. James David Manning. He speaks the true about his own African race. I am not the one who said it, Many great Black intellectuals such as Dr. Manning admitted it.

I am having a giggle-fest how King Tut and Nefertiti are subjected to American colourism. If one hypothetically believed in reincarnation and King Tut lived in USA, the odds are a million to one he would be a statistic in either the industrial prison complex or amongst the unarmed killed by the police than a Teabagger.

Well, there’s actually a stronger theory that I’ve learnt while studying history at university and it was that the first Egyptian originated from south India, thus being taken as black African.
However It seems that they’ve stayed in Ethiopia and brought their knowledge to become then the Pharaohs. There’s actually a few books written on this subject, I’m very surprised that you guys are only arguing about if they were black African or Caucasian. They were most probably Indian, It would actually settle the feud isn’t it ?

No, the Ancient Egyptians were black Africans , regardless if they were dark , brown or of a lighter skin tone. I find it interesting that the white race now wants to start nick picking the classification of who is in the black race. Back in the past when it was advantageous for them to lump all dark complexion , including mulattos , as being black , so that they could expliot and oppress more people on the planet for not being from the privileged white race. When they had ” white ” and ” Black ” only signs in existence there were no question as to whom were ” Black “. The East Indian man who had petitioned the united States’ courts to have his ” Caucasian ” status recognized in the States was given a dose of hard reality when he was denied the status that they themselves had classified him as. They giveth and they taketh when it’s in their interest to do so. Only now that the world’s population of people of color are growing and their influence over the world is shrinking , they are resulting to the old tactics of ” Divide and Conquer “. Latinos , Asians , Indians , Africans , Arabs , you are all black ! So , let us leave the white man on his small island that HE created for himself in the sea of humanity.

…..White people always try to discredit ancient witnesses, you can’t say that other people’s had black skin and woolly hair to because they also said the Egyptians had hair and skin like the Ethiopians and made no attempt to separate the two in terms of description… When it comes to the Egyptians depicting themselves as different from other Africans those differences are purely artistic… Other black Africans see themselves as different from other black Africans and the artists makes it felt through his creation that doesn’t mean they look different…. Just think of the Hutu and Tutsi tribes, who look like they can be brothers and sisters but yet and still they artistically show differences in their description of one another. This is well documented… White peoples need to stop trying to historically places themselves in Africa/Egypt before they actually were. They were black Africans initially, the skeletal remains show that, why; how could they turn white over night or within a few hundred years, white people aren’t that old of a race..

“Ancient Egyptians weren’t black , as in the same description of darker black Africans ” . What bull shit. Now whites wants to nick pick the amount of melon in an African’s skin to determine whose a ” Black ” African. This is the same bull crap they used to divide Rwanda , as in the movie ” Hotel Rwanda “. The Belgium’s selected the Rwandans with lighter tones and/or with less prominent facial features and placed them in a better social status over the darker tone Rwandans , whom were the majority. This caused , strife , division , and violence , amongst the Rwandans , even though , they were all black Rwandans. These hateful people thrives on creating separations and turmiols amongst people of color. The American Indians said it the best , ” THEY SPEAK WITH FORK TONGUES ” , as with a snake’s tongue.

Someone probably beat me to it.This this is what the ancient Ethiopians said concerning the Egyptians(note: Ethiopian does not mean someone from the modern nation state of Ethiopia but literally just means “blacks”):

“They say also that the Egyptians are colonists sent out by the Ethiopians, Osiris having been the leader of the colony. For, speaking generally, what is now Egypt, they maintain, was not land but sea when in the beginning the universe was being formed; afterwards, however, as the Nile during the times of its inundation carried down the mud from Ethiopia, land was gradually built up from the deposit. Also the statement that all the land of the Egyptians is alluvial silt deposited by the river receives the clearest proof, in their opinion, from what takes place at the outlets of the Nile; for as each year new mud is continually gathered together at the mouths of the river, the sea is observed being thrust back by the deposited silt and the land receiving the increase. And the larger part of the customs of the Egyptians are, they hold, Ethiopian, the colonists still preserving their ancient manners. For instance, the belief that their kings are gods, the very special attention which they pay to their burials, and many other matters of a similar nature are Ethiopian practices, while the shapes of their statues and the forms of their letters are Ethiopian; for of the two kinds of writing which the Egyptians have, that which is known as “popular” (demotic) is learned by everyone, while that which is called “sacred” is understood only by the priests of the Egyptians, who learn it from their fathers as one of the things which are not divulged, but among the Ethiopians everyone uses these forms of letters. Furthermore, the orders of the priests, they maintain, have much the same position among both peoples; for all are clean who are engaged in the service of the gods, keeping themselves shaven, like the Egyptian priests, and having the same dress and form of staff, which is shaped like a plough and is carried by their kings, who wear high felt hats which end in a knob at the top and are circled by the serpents which they call asps; and this symbol appears to carry the thought that it will be the lot of those who shall dare to attack the king to encounter death-carrying stings. Many other things are also told by them concerning their own antiquity and the colony which they sent out that became the Egyptians, but about this there is no special need of our writing anything.”http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Diodorus_Siculus/3A*.html

Personally I think Afro-Asiatic originated around Northeast Africa(Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan, Eritrea etc) as well as Yemen. From there it moved north until reaching the what is now Syria and there the Afro-Asiatics met the ancestors of Indo-Europeans, Georgians etc. The Phoenicians, another people that was respected for their antiquity by the Greeks and Romans, thought they originally came from the Erythraean Sea, which can only mean what is now Yemen. Herodotus relates that about the Phoenicians.

Perhaps it’s because it’s Newsweek we are talking about. One person who commented on the Newsweek site summed it up perfectly:

”

Galen Ztoo

I hate to point out the obvious but this is by no means a complete study and it seems to try to walk a fine line between the sensational and out right Bad reporting. The article states that 151 mummies were “looked at” however only three yielded full mapping And one gene had origins from Europe. And how many genes in the human body kids… 20,000. Smoke does not a fire make, lets Waite before we say that Europeans built the pyramids…”

Bias runs deep in such studies. When obviously black people are found it becomes a mystery: “The cemetery’s size and the orderly east-west arrangement of the graves suggested to us that there might be over 100 graves here, indicating a sizeable population of Nubians at Hierakonpolis. Even after severe plundering, the objects we found show that these people had access to a certain level of wealth. They were able to afford wooden coffins, scarabs, and so forth, yet they retained their Nubian burial practices and ceramic technology. It seems unlikely that they were slaves or domestic servants, but who were they? And what are they doing at Hierakonpolis? These are some of the tantalizing questions that in November 2003, with the assistance of a grant from the Michela Schiff-Giorgini Foundation, we returned to the cemetery to try to answer.” http://interactive.archaeology.org/hierakonpolis/nubians.html

I’m sure that if a bunch of white mummies with Gallic characteristics were found in Egypt, the studies would say that they were traders or mercenaries thereby redeeming them. However we know that the Gauls were far from being peaceful. The Romans and Greeks hated the Gauls and(correctly) saw them as plunderers.

Now the Ethiopians, as historians relate, were the first of all men and the proofs of this statement, they say, are manifest. For that they did not come into their land as immigrants from abroad but were p91natives of it and so justly bear the name of “autochthones” is, they maintain, conceded by practically all men; furthermore, that those who dwell beneath the noon-day sun were, in all likelihood, the first to be generated by the earth, is clear to all; since, inasmuch as it was the warmth of the sun which, at the generation of the universe, dried up the earth when it was still wet and impregnated it with life, it is reasonable to suppose that the region which was nearest the sun was the first to bring forth living creatures.

Now Diodorus was Greek and Ethiopia is an untranslated Greek word in the text above that has been borrowed into English. Today Ethiopia makes us think of the modern country of Ethiopia but the Greek word actually comes from Aithiops which means “burnt-face”. So Diodorus is saying that the “burnt-faced people” were the first of all men and goes on to reason that life should reasonably start first under the sun’s heat.

But he doesn’t stop there:

They say also that the Egyptians are colonists sent out by the Ethiopians, Osiris having been the leader of the colony. For, speaking generally, what is now Egypt, they maintain, was not land but sea when in the beginning the universe was being formed; afterwards, however, as the Nile during the times of its inundation carried down the mud from Ethiopia, land was gradually built up from the deposit.

So after establishing that the Ethiopian, or “burnt-faced people”, were the “first of all men” and the original natives (autochthones) Diodorus relates that they say the Egyptians were Ethiopian colonists. What follows is, to me, a somewhat astonishing account of the creation of the Nile delta. Can you imagine people in New Orleans casually relating that long ago this area was sea but as the river deposited sediment it became dry land and our ancestors came from the North to settle it? How long would you have to have been living in the area to say that?

Diodoros goes on to comment on how they back up the statement that the Nile generated the land of Egypt and compares Egyptian and broader Ethiopian custom.

Also the statement that all the land of the Egyptians is alluvial silt deposited by the river receives the clearest proof, in their opinion, from what takes place at the outlets of the Nile; for as each year new mud is continually gathered together at the mouths of the river, the sea is observed being thrust back by the deposited silt and the land receiving the increase.

And the larger part of the customs of the Egyptians are, they hold, Ethiopian, the colonists still preserving their ancient manners. For instance, the belief that their kings are gods, the very special attention which they pay to their burials, and many other matters of a similar nature are Ethiopian practices, while the shapes of their statues and the forms of their letters are Ethiopian; for of the two kinds of writing which the Egyptians have, that which is known as “popular” (demotic) is learned by everyone, while that which is called “sacred” is understood only by the priests of the Egyptians, who learn it from their fathers as one of the things which are not divulged, but among the Ethiopians everyone uses these forms of letters.

The Greeks took, but didn’t try to hide where they took from because it would have been impossible. However, as Egypt was conquered and the original people left or intermixed with the Greeks, Romans and Arabs the demographics of the area changed and it became fashionable to try to whitewash ancient Egypt to complete the destruction of the black people. Constantine de Volney’s 1787 account of his visit to Egypt (then ruled by the Islamic Ottoman Empire) reveals the evolved attitudes. While Diodorus was just frankly relating the facts as he knew them, de Volney had to be shocked given the fact that blacks were now seen as a slave race.

A second race of inhabitants are the Copts, called in Arabic el Kobt.
…
It is pretended that the name Copts is derived from the city of Coptus, whither it has been affirmed they retired from the tyranny of the Greeks; but I am inclined to think it has a more natural and more ancient origin. The Arabic term Kopti, a Copt, seems to me an evident abbreviation of the Greek word Ai-goupti-os, an Egyptian, for the ‘y’ was prounounced ‘ou’, among the ancient Greeks and the Arabs, having neither ‘p’ or ‘g’ before ‘a’, ‘o’, or ‘u’, always substitute for these letters ‘k’ and ‘b’; the Copts then are properly the remains of the Ancient Egyptians.

This will be rendered still more probable if we consider the distinguishing features of this race of people; we shall find them all characterized by a sort of yellowish, dusky complexion which is neither Grecian or Arabian; they have all a puffed visage, swollen eyes, flat noses, and thick lips, in short the exact countenance of a mulatto. I was at first tempted to attribute this to climate but when I visited this sphinx I could not help thinking the figure of that monster furnished the true solution of the enigma: when I say its features precisely those of a Negro I recollected the remarkable passage of Herodotus [Origin: another Greek historian] in which he says, “For my part I believe the Colchi to be a “colony of the Egyptians”, because, like them, “they have black skins and frizzled hair;” that is the Ancient Egyptians were real negroes, of the same species with all the natives of Africa; and though, as might be expected, after mixing for so many ages with the Greeks and Romans, they have lost the intensity of their first colour, yet they still retain strong marks of their original conformation.
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But to return to Egypt: this historical fact affords to philosophy an interesting subject of reflection. How are we astonished when we behold the present barbarism and ignorance of the Copts, descended from the proud genius of the Egyptians, and the brilliant imagination of the Greeks; when we reflect that to the race of negroes, at present our slaves, and the objects of our extreme contempt, we owe our arts, sciences, and even the very use of speech; and when the recollect that, in the midst of those nations who call themselves friends of liberty and humanity, the most barbarous of slaveries is justified; and that it is even a problem whether the understanding of negroes be of the same species with that of white men [ie. whether they have the same intelligence]!

The race of the Ancient Egyptians would not even be a debate if it weren’t for the fact that Eurasian invaders dominate “Egyptology” and seek to distort the truth whenever possible, as is their custom.

Europeans as a people are younger than we thought, a new study suggests.

DNA recovered from ancient skeletons reveals that the genetic makeup of modern Europe was established around 4,500 B.C. in the mid-Neolithic—or 6,500 years ago— and not by the first farmers who arrived in the area around 7,500 years ago or by earlier hunter-gatherer groups.

“The genetics show that something around that point caused the genetic signatures of previous populations to disappear,” said Alan Cooper, director of the Australian Centre for Ancient DNA at the University of Adelaide, where the research was performed.

“However, we don’t know what happened or why, and [the mid-Neolithic] has not been previously identified as [a time] of major change,” he said.

Furthermore, the origins of the mid-Neolithic populations that did form the basis of modern Europe are also unknown.

“This population moves in around 4,000 to 5,000 [B.C.], but where it came from remains a mystery, as we can’t see anything like it in the areas surrounding Europe,” Cooper said.

So you have people living in Europe, then the people whose descendants we’ll know as modern Europeans [white people] move in around 6500 years ago then the original people go “poof”. Scientists cannot establish where these new people originated; they just appeared suddenly and took over.

In a section I won’t quote the article speaks of mitochondrial DNA (present in an organelle in your cells which you inherit from your mother) and how a particular haplogroup [or set of genes inherited together], called H, is dominant among modern Europeans. It then continues to give an account of what it considers to be the history of migration into Europe.

The first modern humans to reach Europe arrived from Africa 35,000 to 40,000 years ago. By about 30,000 years ago, they were widespread throughout the area while their close cousins, the Neanderthals, disappeared. Hardly any of these early hunter-gatherers carried the H haplogroup in their DNA.

About 7,500 years ago during the early Neolithic period, another wave of humans expanded into Europe, this time from the Middle East. They carried in their genes a variant of the H haplogroup, and in their minds knowledge of how to grow and raise crops. (Related: “Egypt’s Earliest Farming Village Found.”)

Archeologists call these first Central European farmers the linear pottery culture (LBK)—so named because their pottery often had linear decorations.
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In this study we show that changes in the European archaeological record are accompanied by genetic changes, suggesting that cultural shifts were accompanied by the migration of people and their DNA.”

The LBK group and its descendants were very successful and spread quickly across Europe. “They became the first pan-European culture, if you like,” Cooper said.

Given their success, it would be natural to assume that members of the LBK culture were significant genetic ancestors of many modern Europeans.

But the team’s genetic analysis revealed a surprise:

So they claim that a second wave of immigration from the Middle East (yet they claim an article on Egypt is “related” so perhaps they’re still talking about Africa) brought farmers and they eventually became the dominant culture in Europe. However they still aren’t the primary ancestors of modern Europeans according to the article.

About 6,500 years ago in the mid-Neolithic, the LBK culture was itself displaced. Their haplogroup H types suddenly became very rare, and they were subsequently replaced by populations bearing a different set of haplogroup H variations.

Mysterious Turnover

The details of this “genetic turnover” event are murky. Scientists don’t know what prompted it, or even where the new colonizers came from.
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Of Mysterious Origins

One thing that is clear from the genetic data is that nearly half of modern Europeans can trace their origins back to this mysterious group.

“About [4,500 B.C.], you start seeing a diversity and composition of genetic signatures that are beginning to look like modern [Central] Europe,” Cooper said. “This composition is then modified by subsequent cultures moving in, but it’s the first point at which you see something like the modern European genetic makeup in place.”

Whatever prompted the replacement of genetic signatures from the first pan-European culture, Cooper is clearly intrigued. “Something major happened,” he said in a statement, “and the hunt is now on to find out what that was.”

So there it is, they don’t know where the ancestors of most modern Europeans came from. They appeared, out of nowhere, about 6500 years ago [i.e 4500 BC, we’re in 2000+ CE]. I find it fascinating that this timeframe corresponds to the timing suggested by some for the biblical creation of Adam [which can mean rosy, red, or ruddy] by the Elohim [technically plural, “gods”] and also the gradual selective breeding of a new psychopathic race of people by a black mad scientist called Yakub [according to NOI]. Perhaps, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.

In any case, such a young race, appearing in 4500 BC, did not originate the customs of the very ancient Nile Valley civilization of which Egypt was a part. They invaded it later from the North just as history tells us after which it died, the Pyramids’ white limestone cladding eventually removed to build mosques. It now sits in ruins while the descendants of the destroyers try to erase even the memory of the natives.

“they don’t know where the ancestors of most modern Europeans came from. They appeared, out of nowhere, about 6500 years ago [i.e 4500 BC, we’re in 2000+ CE].”

There is some speculation that modern Europeans are the descendants of Africans who migrated and lived in Europe. Those African migrants gradually mutated to thrive in the colder environment over a period of ten thousand years.

There is also speculation that the African migrants intermingled with the pre-existing Neanderthal population in Europe which hastened the mutations.

@Afrofem
Yes, Africans did migrate into Europe and the general explanation is that Africans became white for reasons such you mentioned. However, according to the National Geographic article they don’t know how the particular set of people, who became the ancestors of modern, white Europeans, arose. There was a relatively sudden change in quite recent timeframes.

Most of us think of Europe as the ancestral home of white people. But a new study shows that pale skin, as well as other traits such as tallness and the ability to digest milk as adults, arrived in most of the continent relatively recently. The work, presented here last week at the 84th annual meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists, offers dramatic evidence of recent evolution in Europe and shows that most modern Europeans don’t look much like those of 8000 years ago.

Haplogroup H dominates present-day Western European mitochondrial DNA variability (>40%), yet was less common (~19%) among Early Neolithic farmers (~5450 BC) and virtually absent in Mesolithic hunter-gatherers. Here we investigate this major component of the maternal population history of modern Europeans and sequence 39 complete haplogroup H mitochondrial genomes from ancient human remains. We then compare this ‘real-time’ genetic data with cultural changes taking place between the Early Neolithic (~5450 BC) and Bronze Age (~2200 BC) in Central Europe. Our results reveal that the current diversity and distribution of haplogroup H were largely established by the Mid Neolithic (~4000 BC)
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Dated haplogroup H genomes allow us to reconstruct the recent evolutionary history of haplogroup H and reveal a mutation rate 45% higher than current estimates for human mitochondria.

So according to these sources, Europe started to resemble the Europe we know (the home of the white people) approximately 6000 years ago [4000 BC] and it did so relatively suddenly. There were migrations into Europe from Africa tens of thousands of years ago but the transformation of the population into people like today’s “Europeans” was quite a rapid and recent process.

I brought it up because it suggests that the idea that white people are very “ancient” may be flawed and that is clearly one prerequisite for ORIGINATING Africa’s Nile Valley civilization which is very old. Obviously, whites showed up and eventually took over. That’s how the civilization came to an end after existing for millenia.

If one were to really look at humans as they exist in all their variety, one would find people ranging from light pinkish to orangey to dark brownish in their skin colours. But hard pressed would one be to find only one white or black individual. Egypt was in africa. That should suffice. But egypt in all it’s glory was also majorly stupid for erecting such expensive gravestones for their dictators, imho. Just kidding they were neat. And while it is fascinating to learn about one’s heritage, race is for dogs or for fast cars.

Let’s debate if the ancient Greeks and Romans were ” white ” , as they are constantly depicted . Egypt/Kemet is African history and they were black Africans . Even with descriptions from ancient Greeks , Romans , Hebrews , and the Egyptians referencing themselves as ascendants from the southern black skin people nations , many people are still in denial of the Egyptians being a nation of black people .

The talk about the ancient Egyptians being black , but not ” black ” as per se today’s standards is ridiculous . Smh . Couldn’t the same rhetoric be applied to the referring of the ancient Greeks and Romans as being ” white ” , but yet their whiteness are not called into question . If a crime victim had given the description of their assailant as the same description the Greek Herodotus gaved in describing the ancient Egyptians , having black skin And wooly hair , everyone would say that the wanted perpetrator was a BLACK PERSON . Now that the ” black description ” is attached to ancient people who have accomplished historically grand feats it now becomes so inconclusive to the identity of the description . So pathetic 😔